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One of India's biggest medal hopes at the Paris Olympics are men's doubles pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty. The Indian pair have dominated tournaments around the world. SatChi also became the first Indian duo to qualify for the Summer Games for the second consecutive time.
Talking about Badminton qualification for the Olympics, the determining factor is the rankings over a predetermined time frame. The Race to Paris Rankings only considered performances from the qualifying window between May 1, 2023, and April 28, 2024. In this period, the tournaments considered were the Uber Cup, World Championships, Sudirman Cup, and other Grade 2 and Grade 3 events.
The Paris Olympics have spots reserved for the top 16 players, with a maximum of two players per nation. Each of the doubles events has 16 quotas and a maximum of two pairs permitted per country among the top eight in the rankings and the next best eight duos (with a maximum of one per country) are listed. SatChi finished third and ensured their place in Paris.
The Indian duo had a disappointing start in the Sudirman Cup, where they failed to win a single game. The poor performances continued with early exits in the 2023 Thailand Open and Singapore Open. They soon got back to winning ways by becoming the first Indian pair to clinch the BWF Super 1000 Indonesia Open in 2023 in June and then won the Korea Open.
With a gruelling season ahead, the Indian duo decided to take a selective approach with tournaments to keep themselves fit and win consistently. Among these victories was the gold at the Asian Games which made them the first Indian to do so in badminton. A lthough SatChi suffered a couple of losses in the finals in early 2024, their French Open and Thailand Open titles sealed their qualification.
