India’s Devika Sihag pulled off one of the biggest wins of her career by defeating top seed and local star Supanida Katethong in the quarter-finals of the Thailand Masters 2026 women’s singles badminton event in Patumwan on Friday.
Devika Sihag, 63rd in the women’s singles badminton rankings, beat the world No. 16 Thai shuttler 21-19, 21-18 in 40 minutes. The victory earned Devika her maiden semi-final appearance at a BWF Super 300 tournament or higher.
Devika, the 2024 Indian women’s singles national champion, recovered from a slow start in the opening game. She fell 5-0 behind but worked her way back to level at 9-9 before building momentum.
Though Katethong – who has beaten PV Sindhu four times on the BWF World Tour and is an Asian Games women’s team bronze medallist – fought back to 19-19, Devika closed out the game with two straight points.
The second game followed a similar pattern. Trailing 5-3, Devika responded strongly, levelling the scores at 6-6 and then moving ahead to 10-6.
Katethong mounted another recovery to make it 13-13 and later 17-17 but a three-point burst from Devika took her to 20-17 and eventually the victory.
The Indian badminton player will face fifth seed Huang Yu-Hsun of Chinese Taipei, for a place in the final.
Devika won the Malaysia International Challenge – her first International Challenge title – in August last year. She also won the Swedish Open and Portugal International crowns in 2024.
Earlier in the day, Isharani Baruah battled Malaysia’s Wong Ling Ching for over an hour before going down 18-21, 21-16, 21-13.
Isharani trailed 12-6 in the opening game but levelled at 18-18 before closing it out with a three-point run.
The Malaysian, however, dictated the key passages of the next two games – pulling away from 5-5 to 8-5 in the second, and breaking a 12-12 deadlock with an eight-point surge in the decider – to complete the win.
Isharani had earlier knocked out the second-seeded Sung Shuo Yun of Chinese Taipei in the second round.
In the men’s singles, Tharun Mannepalli lost 21-11, 21-17 to the People’s Republic of China’s Zhu Xuan Chen in 37 minutes.
After a one-sided first game, Tharun led 12-8 in the second before Zhu Xuan Chen wiped out the deficit with a four-point run. At 14-14, the Chinese shuttler accelerated with five straight points to take control and close out the match.
Devika will be the lone Indian shuttler in the semi-finals of the BWF Super 300 tournament.
READ MORE: https://www.olympics.com/en/news/thailand-masters-2026-badminton-quarterfinals-india-results
