Krishna Prasad and Dhruv Kapila lost at the Dutch Junior 2018 finals

The emerging men’s doubles duo Krishna Prasad Garaga and Dhruv Kapila lost to Weikeng Liang and Shang Yichen of China in the finals of the Dutch Junior 2018 on Sunday.

It took 36-minutes for the Chinese shuttlers to trounse the third seeded Indians with 22-20, 21-16 at the Junior International Grand Prix tournament which lasted for five days.

Krishna and Dhruv have been touted as India’s next best hope in the men’s doubles for quite a time and are in the 8th spot in the world junior rankings.

At the Asia Junior Championships last year, they made it to the quarter-finals while in the World Championships, they reached the pre-quarter-finals and at the Dutch Junior last year, they finished as the runner-up being the top seeded team.

However, the 17-year old Prasad could progress in to further round in the mixed doubles event with UK Mithula, who bowed out in the third round with 15-21, 21-17, 11-21 against Indonesia’s Leo Rolly Carnado and Metya Inayah Cindiani.

In the women’s singles category, the juggernaut Aakarshi Kashyap failed to save the berth in the next round after losing to the top seeded Pattarasuda Chaiwan with 12-21, 17-21 in 28 minutes of the pre-quarter finals.

11th seeded Purva Barve went one round further, but could not continue her journey. The Pune girl showed her exceptional fighting skills to knock out the seventh seeded Reka Madarasz 21-15, 13-21, 21-14 on her way to the quarter-finals. In the last-eight stage, she was outclassed 13-21, 7-21 by the fourth seeded Chasinee Korepap.

In men’s singles, the ninth seeded Kartikey Gulshan Kumar ousted with 17-21, 7-21 by the top seeded Kunlavut Vitidsarn of Thailand.

In men’s doubles, Vishnu Vardhan Goud Panjala and Srikrishna Sai Kumar Podile could not join compatriots Garaga and Kapila in the last-four stage as they went down 18-21, 11-21 to the title winners Weikeng Liang and Shang Yichen in the quarter-finals.