Satwiksairaj, Chirag cautiously optimistic about home World Championships prospects
Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty said in New Delhi on August 13, 2026 that they are cautiously optimistic about their prospects at the World Championships to be held at home, adding they will take the event one match at a time. The World No. 5 men's doubles pair emphasised they have set no explicit target for the tournament.
A title after two years, several early exits and injury-related withdrawals have defined the duo's 2026 season so far. The pair’s most recent event was the Singapore Open in May, which they won, and they have been forced to pull out of their last two scheduled outings in the months since.
Satwik, who is recovering from a recurring shoulder injury, said: “There is no target, we haven’t spoke anything about that. We just want to be there till the end, go as far as possible.” He added the pair are avoiding putting extra pressure on themselves and prefer to focus on single matches depending on how their bodies respond.
Chirag addressed the limited match practice and the priority of fitness, saying: “Ideally yes, you would want match practice. But coming into a tournament, I wouldn’t say it greatly affects performance,” and “I think the most important thing is to be playing in a tournament injury-free. You don’t want to have a great competitive tournament leading up to the World Championships and then playing through injury.”
The Singapore Open victory ended a two-year title drought that stretched back to the Thailand Open in 2024 and provided a psychological boost for the partnership. “It did give us a lot of relief, a huge boost mentally as well and also confidence-wise. I think it definitely was very important for us because there were some wins like beating the Koreans in the semi-finals, and we understood that whatever we’ve been doing is actually working. It was a step in the right direction,” Chirag said.
Satwik described the season to date as inconsistent while reiterating belief in the pair’s potential when fully fit: “Yeah, it’s been a mixed bag. But I wasn’t really satisfied so far because the kind of game we want to play, we are not up to the mark there. “Losing and winning is fine but we felt somewhere we weren’t playing up to our mark in the first three tournaments. Even in Singapore, we weren’t at 100 percent fitness. But we know when we’re fit enough, we can win tournaments,” he declared.
The duo have won World Championships bronze medals in 2022 and 2025 and are next only to P.V. Sindhu and Saina Nehwal among Indian shuttlers with multiple medals at the marquee event; a third medal at the home World Championships would further their standing. They have said their objective is simply to remain in the tournament and progress as far as their fitness permits.