It wasn’t all plain sailing for Tanvi Sharma against Anmol Kharb in a round-of-16 battle of Indian teenagers at the Orleans Masters Super 300 on Thursday. Early in the second game, Anmol hit the best winner she managed all match – a crisp forehand crosscourt with a late flick of her wrists and a strong whipping motion. Tanvi was floored, lunging to her forehand flank but unable to get to the shuttle. But she got up, dusted herself off, and responded with a superb 1-2 punch next rally, hitting a strong forehand return smash from the backcourt and then playing the most delicate of drop shots to the frontcourt, to leave Anmol stranded.
It was this quality of shotmaking that saw Tanvi, 16, overcome her 18-year-old compatriot 21-14, 21-17 in just 35 minutes. It marked a good day for Indian badminton in women’s singles as three shuttlers made it to the last eight, with Malvika Bansod and Isharani Baruah winning their matches, too. Malvika, on a comeback trail after a long injury break last year, beat Malaysia’s Wong Ling Ching, currently ranked 19 places above the Indian lefty, 24-22, 21-13. And Isharani overcame Canada’s Wen Yu Zhang 21-13, 21-12 in 29 minutes. Isharani and Malvika will face off in another all-Indian clash on Friday, while Tanvi faces a higher-ranked opponent in Japan’s Natsuki Nidaira.
The most intriguing contest of the day pitted two young shuttlers seen as future hopes in a discipline where India has had their two biggest superstars, Saina Nehwal and PV Sindhu, for nearly two decades. Tanvi was off to a strong start, moving her slightly senior opponent around to all four corners of the court in the early exchanges, employing a good mix of tosses to the backcourt and slices to the front for a 6-1 lead. The points Anmol was earning came through Tanvi’s mistakes, until the 19-year-old nailed an inside-out cross smash to make it 6-9. That would only be a flash in the pan as Tanvi took an 11-6 lead into the mid-game interval.
A closer second game, but Tanvi Sharma (17) overcomes Anmol Kharb (19) with a fine display of stroke-making, 21-14, 21-17 to enter QF. Glimpses from Anmol but Tanvi much better overall. This was a crucial winner at 17-17.
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— Vinayakk (@vinayakkm) March 19, 2026
The contest was a bit more even after the break – interestingly, with coaches in their corners in a sight not usually seen in all-India matches – Tanvi continued to be a step ahead of Anmol, reading the attacks well and getting into position early to defend every time the Haryana youngster tried to increase the pace with her power, with her Punjab counterpart opening up a 17-11 lead.
Another lovely illustration of Tanvi’s shot-making skills came at the end of Game 1. She hit two round-the-head smashes from the exact same position midcourt, and for the first winner, she went down the line and changed it in the next point by going cross to pocket the lead.
Tanvi was once again off to a strong start in Game 2 with an 11-7 lead at the interval, and had the finish line in sight. But the next phase of play showed that it is the in-match temperament that Tanvi needs to work on. When she missed a crosscourt drop by quite some margin, she went down on her knees and buried her face in her hands, then was warned a few times by the chair umpire not to delay proceedings between rallies.
While most rallies were short and sharp, at 17-14 in the second game, the teenagers produced their best collective exchange, moving to either flank at pace and hitting the shuttle crisply before Anmol won the point. She made it 17-17 on the back of two errors at the net from her opponent, showing the grit that has come to personify her rise. But Tanvi steadied her nerves and hit a clean round-the-head crosscourt winner at a critical juncture, and wrapped up the match on a run of four straight points. In the bigger picture, Tanvi enhanced her burgeoning reputation as the Indian teen with the greatest ceiling among a promising women’s singles bunch.
Earlier in the day, the men’s doubles duo of Hariharan Amsakarunan and MR Arjun overcame Scotland’s Alexander Dunn and Adam Pringle, winning 26-24 and 21-14.
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In men’s singles, it continues to be an underwhelming start to the season for Ayush Shetty as the world No 25 went down against Yudai Okimoto, ranked 14 places below the Indian, in three games. Despite winning the opener comfortably, Ayush went down against a player from his junior days, 21-9, 18-21, 9-21.
