India's Sporting Extremes at Aichi-Nagoya 2026
Under the lights of Aichi-Nagoya 2026, India’s contingent lived an entire day’s worth of sporting extremes – comebacks, collapses, near-misses and a few emphatic statements of intent.
Badminton: Sen stuns, women bow out, and a quarterfinal hangs in the balance
In the men’s team quarterfinal against Japan, Lakshya Sen ripped up the script.
Up against World No. 7 Kodai Naraoka and trailing by five points in the deciding game, Sen refused to blink. After being outplayed 11-21 in the opener, he roared back 21-5 in the second and then dug into every reserve of fight he had to edge the decider 21-19, taking the match 2-1 and giving India a 1-0 lead in the tie.
It was a classic Lakshya performance – streaky at first, then suddenly ruthless, and finally nerveless when it mattered most.
Behind him, the onus shifted to the experienced pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty, who were set to face the Japanese duo of Takuro Hoki and Yugo Kobayashi with India holding that slender 1-0 advantage.
The women’s team, though, had already walked the hard road earlier in the day – and fallen just short.
The quarterfinal against Japan began with P. V. Sindhu and Akane Yamaguchi reprising their familiar rivalry. Sindhu produced a vintage surge in the opening game, rallying from 13-17 down to steal it 23-21, capitalising on a rare error in judgement from Yamaguchi at game point. But the Japanese star tightened her grip from there. She edged the second game 21-18, then dominated the decider 21-11, closing out a one-hour, 12-minute battle and handing the hosts a 1-0 lead.
Unnati Hooda stepped in next with India under pressure and briefly looked like she might turn the tide. After losing the first game 16-21 to Tomoka Miyazaki, she surged to an 11-4 lead in the second. That window closed abruptly. Miyazaki reeled her back in, took the game 21-18, and with it a 2-0 advantage for Japan.
India’s hopes hung on the doubles pair of Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand. They delivered. In a must-win rubber, the World Championships bronze medallists outplayed Yuki Fukushima and Mayu Matsumoto 21-17, 21-16, dragging India back to 1-2 and forcing the tie into a fourth match.
The final word belonged to Nozomi Okuhara.
Facing teenager Tanvi Sharma in a do-or-die third singles for India, the former World Champion barely allowed the youngster a foothold. Okuhara controlled the rallies, closed the angles, and ran out a comfortable 21-12, 21-10 winner to seal a 3-1 victory for Japan and end India’s women’s team campaign.
Cricket: Mandhana headlines a batting statement
On the cricket field, India’s women sent a clear message in the gold-medal match against Sri Lanka.
After winning the toss and choosing to bat, the openers came out swinging. By the end of the PowerPlay, India had thundered to 67 without loss, with Smriti Mandhana on 38* and Shafali Verma on 29*, both dismantling the Sri Lankan attack.
The momentum never really dipped.
Mandhana top-scored with a blazing 79 off 45 balls, while Shafali fell just short of a half-century with 48 off 29. Richa Ghosh then added a brutal late flourish, hammering 49 from only 22 deliveries as India piled up 216/3 – its third-highest total in WT20I history.
Chamari Athapaththu and Sri Lanka were left staring at a towering chase with a gold medal on the line.
Shooting: From world-record shadow to final heartbreak
In 10m air rifle mixed team, Parth Mane and Elavenil Valarivan spent the morning shooting in the slipstream of a world record.
They compiled 634.6 in qualification, finishing second behind China’s Wang Zifei and Sheng Lihao, who set a new Qualification World Record with 638.9. That score pushed India comfortably into the four-team final alongside China, Republic of Korea and Japan.
In the final, the early pattern held. After the first 10-shot series, China led with 107.2, Korea sat second on 104.9, Japan third on 103.9 and India fourth with 103.6. The Indian pair never quite found the extra gear to climb out of that position.
China continued to stretch away, Japan and Korea traded places, and India stayed rooted to the bottom of the standings through the second and third series. When it ended, China had gold with a World Record total of 507.1, Republic of Korea claimed silver with 502.9, Japan took bronze on 439.7, and Parth-Elavenil finished fourth with 376.3 – agonisingly close, but outside the medals.
Table tennis: Women fight through a thriller; men crash out
The women’s table tennis team packed an entire campaign’s worth of drama into one tie against Thailand.
India No. 1 Sreeja Akula opened the round of 16 in control, racing to a 2-0 lead in games against Orawan Paranang. Then the match flipped. Paranang stormed back, and though Sreeja held match point at 10-9 in the decider, she couldn’t close it out. The Thai paddler snatched a 3-2 win (7-11, 1-11, 11-9, 11-6, 12-10), handing Thailand a 1-0 lead and leaving India rattled.
Yashaswini Ghorpade steadied the ship. She produced a gutsy 3-2 comeback of her own against Suthasini Sawettabut, winning 11-8, 5-11, 7-11, 11-9, 11-9 to level the tie at 1-1.
Diya Chitale then pushed Jinnipa Sawettabut to the brink but fell just short in a five-game scrap, losing 2-3 (7-11, 11-5, 11-7, 7-11, 11-13). At 1-2 down, India needed another rescue act from Yashaswini. She delivered again, this time in straight games, overpowering Orawan Paranang 3-0 (11-5, 11-8, 11-9) to drag the tie into a deciding fifth rubber.
Sreeja returned to the table, this time against Suthasini Sawettabut, and made no mistake. A sharp forehand down the line sealed a 3-1 win (9-11, 11-6, 12-10, 11-8), clinching the tie 3-2 and sending India into the quarterfinals, where North Korea awaits.
The men’s team, by contrast, never quite got going against Republic of Korea in their round of 16.
Harmeet Desai lost the opener 1-3 (11-8, 7-11, 8-11, 9-11) to Jang Woojin. Manush Shah battled hard in the second rubber, taking his match against Oh Junsung to a decider but failing to close it out. The final nail came from An Jaehyun, who beat Manav Thakkar 3-1 (12-10, 11-6, 7-11, 12-10), completing a 3-0 sweep and ending India’s campaign.
Kabaddi: Champions flex their muscle
On the kabaddi mat, the defending men’s champions looked exactly that.
India dismantled Korea 63-31 in their second Group A match, a statement win that kept their title defence firmly on track. The margin said everything: raid points flowing, tackles sticking, and the gulf in class widening with each passing minute.
Gymnastics and Wushu: Narrow margins, tidy finishes
In artistic gymnastics, Pranati Nayak put herself in contention on women’s vault. Across her two attempts, she posted 13.000 on the first and 12.433 on the second, for an average of 12.916 that placed her fourth at the time of reporting – on the fringes of the podium, with every decimal likely to matter.
In Wushu, Hanjabam Langlentombi Devi produced a neat all-round performance in the women’s Nanquan & Nandao combined event. She scored 9.403 in Nanquan, finishing ninth of ten, and improved to 9.436 in the Nandao final, eighth in that segment. Her combined total of 18.839 secured ninth place overall in the final.
Fencing: A breakthrough, then a brutal draw
India’s women’s epee campaign traced the arc from promise to hard reality in a matter of hours.
Taniksha Khatri opened with a confident 15-10 win over Thailand’s Natpapat Sangngio in the round of 32, becoming the first Indian fencer of the day to win a knockout bout. That victory set up a daunting round of 16 clash against reigning World Champion Song Sera of Republic of Korea.
The gulf in class showed. Khatri went down 9-15, her competition ending against the best in the world.
On the men’s side, foil fencers Hemash Singh Sanasam and Sachin both battled through a mixed pool stage, each finishing with three wins and two losses and progressing to the round of 32. There, Hemash led Kazakhstan’s Galim Nurumov 6-5 after the first period but couldn’t sustain the charge, losing 9-15. Sachin also exited with a 9-15 defeat to another Kazakh, Timofey Semyonov.
Equestrian eventing: India adrift after dressage
Eventing got underway with the dressage phase, and India’s three riders found themselves chasing the leaders early.
Fouaad Mirza, a double Asian Games silver medallist in this discipline, rode his 10-year-old bay gelding Camouflage 38 to a score of 38.70 and a percentile rating of 61.33, placing 26th. Arjan Singh Nagra, on 12-year-old grey stallion Cooley Goodwood, edged ahead with 38.20 and a 61.80 percentile to finish 23rd.
India’s best dressage score came from Ashish Limaye on Willy be Dun, the 14-year-old bay gelding he also rode at the Hangzhou Games. Limaye posted 35.50 with a 64.47 percentile, good enough for 14th in a 32-rider field where only three athletes broke the 70-percentile mark. China’s Tian Hua, riding Manjushri, topped the standings, with Thailand’s Korntawat Samran and Japan’s Toshiyuki rounding out the top three.
On the team leaderboard, India’s combined score of 112.40 left it seventh out of eight nations, well outside medal range. Japan led the way on 91.60. With cross-country and show jumping still to come, there is room to climb, but the gap is already significant.
Soft tennis and swimming: Mixed fortunes in the margins
Soft tennis delivered a little of everything.
In men’s singles Group C, Aryan Thakur began brightly with a 4-0 win over Bold-erdene Altangerel of Mongolia. His second outing told a different story. Against Chinese Taipei’s Chen Po-Yi, Thakur fell 0-4 (1-4, 2-4, 2-4, 1-4). The defeat consigned India to second place in the group and denied him a spot in the final-eight stage.
In Group D of women’s singles, Aadhya Tiwari’s day split in two. She opened with a 1-4 loss to Thailand’s Alisha Ziegler (4-1, 0-4, 0-4, 2-4, 4-6), then hit back later with a commanding 4-0 victory over Pakistan’s Kainaat Shallwani (4-2, 5-3, 4-1, 5-3) to register her first win.
Jay Meena, cousin of national pole vault record-holder Dev Meena, needed just one group match to advance. He swept Pakistan’s Hussain Arain 4-0 (4-2, 4-0, 4-2, 4-0) to move into the knockouts.
In the pool, India’s men’s 4x100m medley relay team booked a lane in the final. The quartet of Rishabh Das, Danush Suresh, Benedicton Rohit and Akash Mani clocked 3:40.41 in the heats, finishing seventh among 16 teams and securing a spot in the medal race later in the afternoon.
Combat sports: Karate heartbreak, Wushu resilience
Karate offered India a glimpse of history, then delivered a harsh lesson in fine margins.
In men’s kumite -84kg, Chetan Bhatt started his campaign straight from the semifinals, with the prospect of a first-ever karate medal for India dangling in front of him. Jordan’s Mohammad Alja’Fari shut that door emphatically, winning 8-0 and sending Bhatt into the bronze-medal bout instead.
There, against Chung Meng-yu of Chinese Taipei, the contest turned razor-thin. The bout finished 1-1, both scoring a yuko, but Chung took the bronze on the “first point scored” rule. Bhatt walked away empty-handed, beaten by timing rather than effort.
In women’s kumite -55kg, Alisha Choudhary’s route ended even earlier. She lost 1-6 to Indonesia’s Cok Istri Agung Sanistyarani in the round of 16, then saw her faint repechage hopes vanish when Sanistyarani fell in the semifinals, closing off the backdoor path to bronze.
Sepaktakraw and esports: Tough lessons, quiet beginnings
India’s men’s sepaktakraw team ran into a Malaysian side in no mood to offer charity in Group B.
The regu pushed Malaysia hard in the first of three matches, losing 1-2 (13-15, 15-11, 6-15). Malaysia then tightened the screws, taking the second match 2-0 (15-9, 15-12) and the third 2-0 (15-11, 15-5) to complete a 3-0 sweep. India now turns to its final group match against the Philippines seeking a response.
On the esports front, India’s eFootball campaign opened on a quieter note. The duo of Chinmay Sahoo and Danial Patel held Uzbekistan’s Abubakir Iminjonov and Farrukh Mirkhamitov to a 0-0 draw in their first Group D match – a cautious start in a discipline where a single mistake often decides everything.
From Lakshya Sen’s late surge to Chetan Bhatt’s cruel bronze defeat, from Mandhana’s clean hitting to Parth-Elavenil’s narrow miss, India’s day at the Asian Games unfolded like a season compressed into a few hours. The medals column did not always match the effort on display, but the question now is simple: which of these near-misses hardens into resolve when the next whistle blows?
