Picture Credit: Twitter
The Indian Men’s Badminton team scripted history on Sunday as they beat 14-time champions Indonesia in Thomas Cup Final to win their first-ever gold medal in the tournament history. Lakshya Sen, the doubles pair of Satwikairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty, and Kidambi Srikanth won their respective matches to help India beat Indonesia 3-0 in the Final.
The whole nation was overwhelmed by this remarkable achievement by the Men’s team. Everyone extended their wishes to the team for their brave performance throughout the tournament. The Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi too congratulated the team on this massive day.
First, he tweeted as soon as Srikanth defeated Jonathan Christie in the third match and then also interacted with each player over a phone call. “The Indian badminton team has scripted history! The entire nation is elated by India winning the Thomas Cup! Congratulations to our accomplished team and best wishes to them for their future endeavours. This win will motivate so many upcoming sportspersons,” tweeted PM Modi minutes after India’s victory.
Later in the day, he also talked to the whole team over a phone call. The Prime Minister himself shared the video of the phone call on Twitter.
Watch it here:
India do the unbelievable!
It was indeed a commendable effort from the whole team to pull off such a massive win against a team that has won the title most number of times. Lakshya Sen started the proceedings for India on the big day. And the 20-year-old did not disappoint at all. Sen beat Anthony Sinisuka Ginting (8-21, 21-17, 21-16) after trailing 0-1. He took down his Indonesian opponent in one hour and five minutes.
The doubles pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty also impressed against the duo of Mohammad Ahsan and Kevin Sanjaya Sukamuljo. They beat the Indonesian pair 18-21, 23-21, 21-19 in one hour and thirteen minutes. In the third game which turned out to be the final one, Kidambi Srikanth beat Jonathan Christie in straight games of 21-15, 23-21 to seal it for India.