Thomas Cup 2022: India go down 2-3 against Chinese Taipei in their final group clash

After registering two back-to-back wins, the Indian team suffered a narrow 2-3 defeat against Chinese Taipei in their final group clash of the ongoing Thomas Cup 2022 in Bangkok, on Wednesday.

The Group C tie saw a great fight from Indian players as they went down fighting against the Chinese Taipei men's team. Chinese Taipei's Chou Tien Chen and Lakshya Sen of India played out a one hour 20-minute marathon opener which saw Chou coming out victorious.

Tien Chen, ranked four, had to put up a monumental effort to overcome world No. 9 Lakshya Sen, winning 21-19, 13-21, 21-17. In the second match, the world number three doubles pair of Lee Yang and Wang Chi-lin see off the challenge of India's own world-top-10 pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty.

The Chinese Taipei duo were comfortable in the first game, and while Satwik and Chirag provided a sterner test in the second, there was still a straight-games 21-11, 21-19 win for Lee and Wang. After Chinese Taipei raced into a 2-0 lead in their tie against India, they were pegged back in the third match.

Kidambi Srikanth got the first point for the Indians as he defeated Wang Tzu-wei 21-19, 21-16 in a tiring 53-minute slog. After a marathon second men's doubles, the fourth rubber of the tie, Chinese Taipei defeated India to top Group C. Lu Ching-yao and Yang Po-han took an hour and 16 minutes to see off M.R. Arjun and Dhruv Kapila, 21-17, 19-21, 21-19. That gave Chinese Taipei an unassailable 3-1 lead.

H.S. Prannoy then helped India in earning a second point in their tie against Chinese Taipei. Prannoy outlasted Lu Chia-hung 21-18, 17-21, 21-18 in an hour and seven minutes.