Badminton: Meet Tanvi Patri, 13-year-old who won Asian U15 title with clean strokeplay and assured footwork

Clean, smooth strokeplay. Unrushed footwork for court movements which are a result of anticipation. These form the framework of badminton player Tanvi Patri’s U15 Asian Championship triumph. The girl from Balasore, Odisha is just 13, but her family has grand ambitions planned for her. She will be 17 by the time of Los Angeles, 2028, an age at which Ratchanok Intanon became senior world champion.

So despite her entire coaching team at Prakash Padukone Badminton Academy being determined to scale down expectations, Tanvi’s 22-20, 21-11 win over Nguyen Thi Thu Huyen of Vietnam in Chengdu on Sunday, will be seen as a first step towards bigger achievements lined up for her.

Comparisons are inevitable. More so for reference, though the context of all her opponents being raw with under-developed games typical of 15 years, cannot be forgotten. Her sheer fluent strokeplay, the backhands at the net and the flying forehands from the flanks are similar to the recently-retired Paris 2024 silver medallist He Bingjiao. And the footwork which puts her under the shuttle in the nick of time or sooner, Tanvi looks extremely sturdy technically, for an U15 Indian.

She was the shortest on the podium of 4 medallists at Chengdu, before climbing up to the gold step. So there will be growth spurts in coming years, but the right-hander’s attacking hits currently rely on the hop-smashes, and her opponents over the last 3 days expectedly were stronger than her, being older. Yet, Tanvi was scribbled in as the top seed at China in U15, and beat the second-seeded Vietnamese, so this result was along expected lines.

Tanvi Patri in action. (BAI)

For two successive days though, Tanvi showed qualities similar to her academy-mate and Paris Olympics semifinalist Lakshya Sen. She was 12-17 down in the semis on Saturday and 11-17 down in the finals against the quick-moving adventurous Vietnamese on Sunday. But Tanvi remained calm and composed and pulled off an unfussed comeback both times, before breezing through the second set.

PPBA coach Sagar Chopda, who insists on tamping down expectations, says it’s an area to improve. “She has this tendency to start slow, and can start matches better. The first 3-4 points she doesn’t move much, though she covers up leads easily,” he said.

In the final, she again took her time in the initial rallies, and was hanging in at 10-11 in the opener, before the break. The taller Vietnamese then went on a 6-point surge to open up a big lead. Undeterred, Tanvi upped her foot-speed and confidently went for the lines besides staying error-free at the net.

Her net-stride is super assured, and the backhand flicks nerveless, not prone to errors under trailing pressure. Twice her opponent crossed on her dribbles, coach Chopda noted, but Tanvi lifted smartly. She also has an unconventional zippy backhand serve that shoots out quick, though it’s her natural strokeplay that stands out, despite lacking in visible power.

The body defense, like He Bingjiao’s is equally smooth, though if repeatedly pushed to the backline, she lacks the power to deal with repeated flat tosses. “The girl she beat in the third round, was the same opponent Tanvi had lost to at Thailand quarterfinals earlier, on slow courts. There’s lots of work to do on her game, but at the moment we want her to enjoy the game,” Chopda says.

At 13, she’s made quarterfinals at an All India senior ranking, and semis of a junior ranking, and she was under-age to make it to India’s U19 world juniors squad last year. But as Chopda added, “She’s not strong or tall like Saina or Sindhu. But she has a spark that makes her different from the rest, like them and Lakshya.”

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