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Gruelling schedule

Sindhu’s gruelling Saturday appeared to catch up with her in the quarterfinal against Chen on Sunday. After a promising start, in which she produced sharp, steep smashes and dominated proceedings, she lost 21-11, 18-21, 10-21, bringing India’s badminton campaign to an end.

Yufei indulged in long rallies in the second and third games, tiring an already fatigued Sindhu to end India’s badminton campaign. Minutes earlier, Unnati Hooda had also lost her women’s singles quarterfinal, going down 16-21, 21-14, 17-21 to Japan’s Akane Yamaguchi.

India finished with just the men’s team bronze and failed to win an individual medal at the Asian Games for the first time since 2014.

Sindhu did not directly blame the scheduling for her loss but pointed to inadequate recovery as a key factor. She was hardly alone in her frustration over the schedule.

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Japan’s Kodai Naraoka woke up on Sunday feeling “extremely fatigued” after playing twice on Saturday, while Indonesia’s Jonatan Christie, who finished his third-round match at 2am, said he was “very disappointed” with the organisers. Thailand’s Ratchanok Intanon, meanwhile, said she had not properly recovered after playing twice the previous day before facing world No. 1 An Se-young.

The complaints have put the spotlight on a schedule that left players juggling multiple matches, late finishes and early starts, with little time to recover between them.

“We don’t usually practise playing two matches a day, so it was challenging to adjust,” Naraoka said.

Christie’s experience was even more extreme. He went to bed at 3.30am after finishing his previous match at 2am, woke up at 9am and then rushed to prepare for his next match.

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“I’m very disappointed with the organiser. I think they have done a bad thing for the athletes. They don’t care about the athletes. That’s it,” he said after his defeat.

Intanon, who lost to defending champion An, who herself claimed she was “tired”, said she had reached her hotel at 11pm after playing twice on Saturday. The early start the following morning left her with little time to recover.

“My body was not very fit,” she said. “After yesterday (two singles matches in one day), I was a bit tired, and we finished a bit late last night. Today we played quite early and I was not properly recovered.”

While the turnaround times have also been punishing for doubles players, singles players have borne much of the burden, particularly those who competed in the team event, which ended on Thursday, before moving straight into the individual competition.

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Women’s doubles world No. 1 Tan Ning of China also criticised the scheduling, alleging that complaints from different teams had been treated differently.

“I feel the schedule is unfair. We went to make an official complaint, but the chief referee didn’t do anything about it. But when the Japan team complained, they actually changed the time schedule,” she told Chinese media.

The organisers had already revised the badminton schedule before the competition began. On September 17, the Aichi-Nagoya organising committee announced changes to several sessions, citing changes in the number of participating athletes. For badminton, the September 26 programme was altered, with the mixed doubles second round moved out of that session.

There has been no official explanation, however, following the players’ complaints.

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Recovery Concerns

For Sindhu, the problem was not simply the number of matches but the physical toll of having to play again before her body had recovered.

“Even though you think you are doing good, physically you might not be able to go there or you might not be able to play,” she said. “When there are long rallies, definitely, yes, recovery. When you had a good thing, you would automatically, but your legs don’t move.”

She acknowledged that the matches themselves had been good but felt the scheduling needed to be better.

“Three matches in 24 hours, is it some kind of, not just first time, mentally how do you prepare yourself?” she said. “I think more than mentally, you need to recover.”

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By the time she left the stadium on Sunday, it was nearly 3pm, bringing to a close a gruelling 24 hours that had included three energy-sapping matches and a heartbreaking exit.