Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand reach BWF World Championships semifinals in New Delhi

Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand defeated China's Jia Yi Fan and Zhang Shu Xian in the quarterfinals of the BWF World Championships 2026 at the Indira Gandhi Indoor Stadium in New Delhi on Friday, August 21, 2026, advancing to the semifinals and securing a medal.

The victors repeatedly told each other to stay calm during a tense encounter against the No.4 seeds, a pairing that between them holds five World Championship medals and two Olympic medals. The match ended when Yifan sent the shuttle wide on match point; Gayatri sprawled on the court and Treesa rushed to embrace coaches Pullela Gopichand and B. Sumeeth Reddy, after which the players took a long break before returning to answer questions.

Treesa admitted, "It was really difficult with all the emotions and processing what had finally happened but we are ok now," and added, "We are really happy to get into the semifinals and confirm a medal but we are not stopping here. There are matches still to come."

Gayatri insisted there would be little change in their approach to the next match, saying, "We don’t want to think too much about the outcome. Today was also a tough match, we knew it would not be easy. We were trailing by a game and even in the second, it was tricky. We told each other to stay calm and will do the same tomorrow, get on court and give our 100 percent and just enjoy."

On the presence and role of their coach, Gayatri said: "When we started as partners, he was the one who told us he believed we could achieve something big. It is really special to have him in the chair, he has been a big support and I am grateful he can travel with us. "He was telling us to just stay calm, stay in the present and that really helped. There have been a few tournaments where I have messed up with my greediness to score quickly. Today we were not greedy, we were just being patient and waiting for the right moments to the points."

Their next opponents will be the top-seeded pair of Sheng Shu Liu & Ning Tan in the semifinals, with Treesa and Gayatri set to carry the same calm-minded approach into that match.