Treesa Jolly to become first Malayali woman to win BWF World Championships medal, storms into semis

New Delhi: India's Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand staged a stunning comeback against China's Jia Yi Fan and Zhang Shu Xian to storm into the women's doubles semi-finals of the BWF World Championships here on Friday, assuring themselves of at least a bronze medal.

The unseeded Indian pair, who are on a comeback trail following Treesa's ankle injury, battled for one hour and nine minutes to defeat the fourth-seeded Chinese duo 16-21, 21-15, 21-13.

The victory makes Treesa the first Malayali woman to win a medal at the BWF World Championships. The Kannur native was conferred the Arjuna Award earlier this week.

H S Prannoy, who won a bronze in the men's singles at the 2023 World Championships, is the only other Malayali to have won a medal at the event.

The win also ended India's 15-year wait for a World Championships medal in women's doubles. The country's last medal in the event came in 2011, when Jwala Gutta and Ashwini Ponnappa won bronze in London.

It was an especially significant victory for Treesa and Gayatri, who had entered the quarter-final with a 0-3 head-to-head record against the Chinese pair.

The victory adds another chapter to a partnership that has already enjoyed considerable success. Treesa and Gayatri reached the All England Open semi-finals in 2022 and 2023, won a Commonwealth Games bronze in 2022 and broke into the world's top 10 at the start of 2025.

Their progress was interrupted earlier this year when Treesa suffered an ankle injury during training ahead of the Asia Badminton Championships and Uber Cup. The injury forced her into a gruelling rehabilitation programme.

The pair returned to competition at the Indonesia Open before playing at the US Open and winning the Philippine International Challenge earlier this month.
Now, they are one victory away from a place in the World Championships final.