Giant turns Giantkiller: How Ayush Shetty stunned Shi Yu Qi to script historic World Championships upset on debut

Ayush Shetty, the man of the hour, led the dance for the most part during his encounter with Shi Yuqi at the badminton World Championships in New Delhi. | Photo Credit: BAI

For the past couple of weeks, ever since the draws for the BWF World Championships were unveiled – showing him up against the reigning world champion and top seed in the opening round – Ayush Shetty had been writing down and looking daily at a single sentence.

“August 17th will be a bad day for Shi Yuqi,” it read.

Coach Vimal Kumar at Bengaluru’s Center of Excellence had advised Ayush to write that down. The note was meant to give him the self-belief to turn around what on paper seemed a particularly mighty challenge. What was written on paper would be manifested into thrilling reality on Monday evening at New Delhi’s Indira Gandhi stadium.

On his fifth match point of a one-hour-and-10-minute-long contest, the 21-year-old, ranked 22nd in the world, held his nerve and ousted the reigning World No. 1 from China 21-14, 13-21, 21-19 to move into the second round of his debut World Championships.

The win was Ayush’s first against Shi and overturned a run of three straight losses, including twice this year.

That most recent defeat had come in the finals of the Asian Championships, where Ayush had been simply blitzed apart, losing 21-8, 21-10. The 31-year-old from China had controlled the entire match on that occasion.

In New Delhi, though, it was the Indian who led the dance. He had the Chinese stunned with his thunderous smashes, punching down using all of the 6 foot 5 inches of his frame.

The smash is a flashy weapon, but it alone doesn’t win matches. His height has often meant Ayush has been defensively vulnerable. On Monday, though, he retrieved relentlessly, forcing Shi to play yet another stroke when otherwise he would have been preparing to serve for the next point. When he found himself out of place, he would buy time using perfectly placed lifts. And if all these weren’t enough, he mixed in deception as well; the match was won with a cleverly placed push that left Shi stranded in the front of the court.

There have been upsets at previous World Championships. Fellow Indian HS Prannoy had beaten former World champion Viktor Axelsen in the quarterfinals of the 2023 Worlds. Then reigning Olympic champion Axelsen had been beaten by Loh Kean Yew in the opening round of the 2022 Worlds.

But until Monday evening, never before had the top seed and reigning World champion faltered in the very first round of his title defence.

A gracious Shi would give Ayush all the credit. “I’m not injured. Ayush just played better than me,” he told reporters after the match.

The fact is that Shi was uncharacteristically error-prone on the day. Some of that had to do with conditions on the centre court. All players have noted that the air conditioning drift that blows from the spectators’ gallery has tended to push shuttles from that direction perpendicularly. That meant that shuttles judged to be falling out ended up landing well in.

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It was Ayush who had that favourable side first up, and he made the most of it. Every time Shi lifted the shuttle, he was left unsure of whether he was going to hit long or if he had overcompensated for Ayush’s smash.

When the players changed sides in the second game, Shi returned the favour. This made the match a shootout in the third. Ayush would have the favourable side for the first half of the deciding game. Then he would have to defend whatever lead he would have had managed once he moved to the tougher side.

Ayush opened up a 11-5 lead. But then when Shi would have hoped to claw things back, the Indian only extended his lead. His lifts were pinpoint perfect. His smashes went as if he were dropping them from a few inches instead of across the net. A cross-court smash won Ayush the first point after the break. Two full-length dives to retrieve Shi’s smashes eventually forced an error by the defending champion to make it 13-5. The spectators’ gallery could hardly contain their excitement as Ayush opened a yawning 17-6 lead in the decider.

‘Just keep your cool’

It seemed that Ayush was romping to victory. But Shi is world champion for a reason. Ayush, still 21, seemed unsure for the first time in the contest. He misjudged line calls. The lead was slowly whittled down. Ayush tried to break Shi’s momentum, calling for breaks to wipe the court, but was rebuffed. Five match points steadily dropped away to four and then three and two until it seemed that Shi was about to complete an unbelievable comeback.

Ayush must have known this was possible. "I knew when I was preparing for the match that this would be a test both physically and mentally,” he’d say after the match.

He reminded himself. “Just keep your cool. Just keep your cool.”

That’s exactly what he did. When the last play of the match saw the shuttle land square in the backhand corner of Shi’s court, for a few moments at least, Ayush couldn’t seem to fathom what he had just accomplished. He had been giving himself fist pumps at crucial points in the match, but in the end, he simply stood still and soaked in the moment.

By taking out the world champion, Ayush has thrown open his men’s singles bracket at the World Championships. A run to the semifinals is his for the taking. Ayush isn’t thinking that far ahead. “Have to be at my best on all days. Just focussing on the next round for now,” he says.