Sumit Nagal’s quarterfinal loss in tennis men’s singles competition at the Asian Games 2026 on Thursday, brought a new low in the sport for the country at the continental showpiece. After the exit of medal hopeful doubles pairs on Wednesday, India needed Nagal to keep the country in the medal hunt, but he went down to China’s Yibing Wu.
In a match which lasted one hour and 38 minutes, , India’s no.1 ranked player, lost 4-6, 4-6 to Yibing, thus bringing the curtains down on India’s campaign in the competition in tennis. As a result, India returned home without a medal for the first time since 1986. In every single edition since 1990, India have won medals at .
This time too, at least three medals were expected. Prajnesh Gunneswaran and Ankita Raina were the last singles players to win medals at the Asian Games. Both stood on the podium with bronze in 2018 Jakarta Games.
After the recent heartbreaking Davis Cup defeat to South Korea in Seoul in the Qualifiers Round two, a medal-winning show in Japan would have given the tennis fans some solace. India missed out on singles medals in 2023 Hangzhou, with Nagal losing at the quarterfinal stage and Ramkumar Ramanathan exiting in the third round.
, who rose to world no.1 rank in the world, helped India win two gold medals in 2018 (men’s doubles with Divij Sharan) and 2022 (Rutuja Bhosale). After his retirement, India’s best doubles players Yuki Bhambri and N Sriram Balaji were expected to carry forward the tradition, but they crashed out from both men’s doubles and mixed doubles.
Balaji-Anirudh Chandrasekar and Bhambri-Dhakshineswar Suresh both fell at the quarterfinal stage. India’s new tennis hope Dhakshineswar fell in the third round in the men’s singles. is already 29 and by the time Doha hosts the next Asian Games in 2030, the player from Jhajjar will be 33.
India coach Ashutosh Singh, who watched India’s campaign collapse in front of his eyes, told PTI, “We obviously would have wanted stronger results, particularly given the quality and experience within the team.” He acknowledged that the level of competition was “extremely high” but expected the singles player to rise up to the occasion.
AITA interim Secretary General Sunder Iyer was guarded in his reaction to India’s dismal show but acknowledged that the national federation needs to support players in a better way. “Players have tried to do their best. We reached three quarter-finals and were close to medals. As an association we need to see how to give more support to our players, juniors and professionals enabling them to do better,” Iyer told PTI.
