MUMBAI: Discovery Communications branded sports channel DSport has acquired the exclusive India broadcast rights for the upcoming Badminton Asia Team Championships 2018.
The annual continental event in its 38th edition will feature Asian badminton powerhouses competing as a team rather than individuals. The 38th edition will see a total of 245 elite Asian shuttlers battling it out at Alor Setar, Kedah, Malaysia. This event also acts as the qualifiers from Asia for the Thomas & Uber Cup 2018. The Badminton Asia Team Championships will be broadcast on DSport from February 9 through to February 11.
This is the first time that DSport will be broadcasting an elite badminton championship with Indian stars participating as a team. 19 top Indian shuttlers would be representing Team India at the elite team championship. Notable names include Rio Olympic Silver medallist PV Sindhu along with world No.5 Kidambi Srikanth, world No.11 HS Prannoy, world No.18 B Sai Praneeth, Sameer Verma, Satwiksairaj Rankireddy, N Sikki Reddy and Ashwini Ponappa.
TS Panesar, head of Dport Business, said, “This is our first major acquisition in the sport of badminton and we are glad to bring to the Indian fans live action from Malaysia with top Indian shuttlers participating in the event. With this we are proud to live up to our ambition of becoming a truly diverse sports broadcasting channel with programming that suits a wide array of sports fans.”
Other notable names would include world No. 2 Lee Chong Wei from Malaysia, world. No. 4 Son Wan Ho from Korea and world No. 8 Shi Yuqi from China, world No. 9 NG Kalong from Hong Kong, world No. 10 Anthony Sinisuka Ginting in the men’s discipline, while the women’s pack would see participation from Japanese world No. 2 Akane Yamaguchi and world No. 7 Nozomi Okuhara, Chinese world No. 8 and 9 Chen Yufei and He Bingjiao and world No. 6 Sung Ji Hyun from Korea.
The men’s doubles category will see participation from some notable names that include world No. 1 Indonesian pair of Kevin Sanjaya Sukamuljo and Marcus Fernaldi Gideon, world No. 5 Japanese duo of Takeshi Kamura and Keigo Sonoda world No. 7 and 8 Chinese Taipei pairs of Chen Hung Ling and Wang Chi-Lin and Lee Jhe-Huei and Lee Yang. World No. 2,4 and 6 Japanese pairs of Ayaka Takahashi and Misaki Matsutomo, Yuki Fukushima and Sayaka Hirota and Shiho Tanaka and Koharu Yonemoto, world No. 7 Greysia Polli and Apriyani Rahayu from Indonesia will comprise the top seeded women’s doubles teams at the tournament. Some other notable women’s doubles players who would be seen playing sans their regular partners would include Korean world No. 5 Chang Ye Na and world No. 9 Shin Seung Chang.
The teams participating in the championship will comprise both men’s and women’s events. Each team have to play ties comprising three men’s singles and two men’s doubles in men’s category and likewise in women’s category. Each team shall not nominate less than four players and not more than 10 players.
