Munching on a chocolate, Kidambi Srikanth tells us that his world hasn't come to a standstill. Hours after missing out on a maiden medal at the World Championships, the Indian is strikingly composed and offers no excuses. It's half past three in the evening in Glasgow when ESPN catches up with Srikanth, the gut-wrenching pain of the quarterfinal defeat against world No 1 Son Wan Ho on the ebb. "Yeah, I'm a little disappointed by the way I played. I just made way too many errors and gave Son a huge lead," he says.
Going into the match, both head-to-head match-ups and recent history favoured Srikanth. This year, in both the previous occasions that they've played against each other - at the Indonesia Open and Australia Open - the Indian had finished on the winning side. "You know, every time you face a top player it's going to be different," Srikanth says, "We had last played each other in June and in two months a lot could have changed. It's tough to tell how prepared your opponent would be."
As the world No 10 Indian mounted a spirited comeback in the second game to close in 17-19 from a frightful 5-16, coach Pullela Gopichand watched from sidelines, unwavered. Seated in the chair beside him, singles coach Mulyo Handoyo pumped his fists and cheered as Srikanth flung crosscourt slices and monstrous smashes out of the scrambling Korean's reach. Srikanth, who's in the middle of an incredible year with two Superseries titles from three finals, was to soon script an end to his 13-match winning streak with a missed net kill.
"When you give a player like Son such a huge lead right at the start, you can't expect to come back. I just couldn't play well enough, just couldn't finish points. It wasn't really nerves. I actually couldn't feel anything on court."
Stuffing his racket into his bag, Srikanth stayed back at the venue to watch PV Sindhu assure herself a third World championship medal. "Gopi sir and I didn't really get to speak about the match after it was over. I was in my thoughts and he was probably thinking about Sindhu's match since it was a little while after mine. He'll probably talk to me about it tomorrow," he adds, over a pause. "But the way they both (Sindhu and Saina) are playing, I think we'll come back with two medals."
The last (also the first) time an Indian male player won a World Championship medal - a bronze by Prakash Padukone in 1983 - was exactly a decade before Srikanth was born. This is the first time Srikanth made the quarterfinals in three appearances at the tournament so far and he's willing to wait his turn for a podium finish. "Now, my dream for a medal has only grown stronger," he says, "You know how they say, the longer the wait, the sweeter the win."