Confirmed: Indian badminton stars Saina Nehwal and Kidambi Srikanth to miss Tokyo Olympics 2021

In a major disappointment to millions of fans of Indian badminton fans, it has been revealed that fan-favorites Saina Nehwal and Kidambi Srikanth will miss the 2021 Tokyo Olympics.

The former World No. 1 shuttlers Saina Nehwal and Kidambi Srikanth’s chances of sealing their respective spots for the Tokyo Olympics are all but over, after the Badminton World Federation (BWF) on Friday confirmed that no further tournaments will be played inside the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games qualifying window.

The qualification period officially closes on June 15, 2021 as per the Revised Tokyo 2020 Qualification System.

The sport's global governing body said that the current Race to Tokyo rankings list will not change.

However, in case of withdrawals by some of the already qualified players, the reallocation of spots cannot be ruled out, which is something that will become clearer in the coming weeks.

“The Olympic qualification process is, in effect, closed, as there are no additional opportunities for players to earn points,” said BWF secretary general Thomas Lund on Friday.

He added,

“However, we still need to receive confirmation from the National Olympic Committees and Member Associations, followed by any possible reallocations, and this will take a number of weeks to complete.”

The deadline for Tokyo Olympics entries is July 5, 2021. The initial number of athletes per event is set at 38 each for men’s singles and women’s singles, and 32 (16 pairs) for each of the three doubles events.

In singles, there are two quota places for each NOC if both are ranked in the top 16 according to the Race to Tokyo list of June 15, 2021.

In doubles, there are two quota places per NOC if the pairs are ranked within the top eight.

Kidambi Srikanth and Saina Nehwal

Saina Nehwal not part of four Indian shuttlers to qualify for Tokyo Olympics

PV Sindhu, Sai Praneeth, Chirag Shetty and Satwiksairaj Rankireddy are the only four Indians who have now qualified on the basis of their current world rankings.

Rio Olympic silver medallist PV Sindhu is ranked seventh in women’s singles. London Olympic bronze medallist Saina Nehwal has now slipped to world No. 19. Saina Nehwal was not fully fit during the last Olympics, and she failed to produce her best form in Rio owing to a foot injury.

In the men’s singles, B Sai Praneeth will be the lone representative from India. Despite a solid ranking of world No. 14, Kidambi Srikanth will unfortunately miss the bus. The winner of several Super Series titles, Kidambi Srikanth had represented India at the Rio Olympics.

The men’s doubles pair of Chirag Shetty and Satwiksairaj Rankireddy, ranked world No. 10, will be the only doubles team from India at the Tokyo Olympics.

“Badminton Association of India (BAI) tried hard and requested BWF to consider Saina Nehwal and Kidambi Srikanth’s participation through a letter. However, nothing happened as BWF said they can’t do anything regarding this because of a prior set of certain rules and regulations. Actually both Saina and Srikanth deserve to play but due to a series of cancelation of tournaments they could not improve their rankings,” said BAI joint secretary Mayur Parikh, adding that it was a major blow to Saina Nehwal and Kidambi Srikanth.

BAI Secretary (Tournaments) Omar Rashid was also disappointed to get the news regarding Saina Nehwal and Kidambi Srikanth from BWF. However, he is hoping that India can still win a medal despite the absence of Saina Nehwal and Kidambi Srikanth.

“The cancelation of three tournaments in the last couple of months proved costly for the Indian duo. The Indian Open, Malaysian Open, and Singapore Open were supposed to be held, but because of COVID-19 situations and travel bans of these three tournaments were canceled resulting in the loss of many Indian players. Even our mixed doubles and women’s doubles pairs had chances to make the cut for the Tokyo Olympics,” said Omar Rashid.