Reaching their first ever quarterfinals of the Super 1000 Indonesia Open, Arjun-Hari scored a gutsy 16-21, 21-15, 21-19 win over Malaysian World No 23 Aaron Tai and Kang Khai Xing, kept India rolling into Friday, a week after Satwik-Chirag won at Singapore.

Coach Tan has been tweaking Indian techniques and torpedoeing opponents ever since Jwala Gutta-Ashwini Ponappa. Before he left for Japan to work with Park Joo bong, he had paired off Satwik and Chirag to great success. He returned to India after Paris, and set about his badminton kintsugi project. When bringing Satwik-Chirag together, the man left behind was MR Arjun.

The 30-year-old from Kochi spent a considerable time tending to injuries and picking the pieces of a career that hinges on a partner. After Chirag, his pairing with Dhruv Kapila hadn’t quite taken off. But Tan saw great potential in him combining with young Hariharan Amsakarunan.

Hari’s pairing with Ruben Rethinasabapathi however had to be broken, to put his vision of a combined style to effect. Even as coach Tan propped up confidence of Satwik-Chirag and got Tanisha-Dhruv to a fairly good level, the MD2 needed patching back.

Hariharan came from Mannargudi, Thiruvarur, where his father worked in the transport sector around the rajagopuram temple economy. The finances were not much, but Hari’s sister Deepika played badminton. “He also started in 6th standard. He always had a very good smash,” she says. He would move to Coimbatore subsequently for 3 years, before being picked for the Gopichand Academy.

Arjun confirms that Coach Tan saw an opportunity straight away as they were paired together last year, and worked their way up to World No 30.

Cut to summer of 2026. After medalling alongside the Thomas Cup bronze winning team, the pair were back on the Tour in Singapore. The Malaysian junior World champions, considered wonder kids, had defeated the Indians at Syed Modi last winter. But Tan was determined to equip them with knowledge against the Malaysians.

Arjun even sat on the coaching chair last week, as Satwik-Chirag pulled out a win against the spirited young pair. “I sat with coach Tan for the Satwik-Chirag game, so we knew what toexpect,” Arjun told the BWF. Having lost the first set after a spurt of errors, the Indians pulled things back nicely.

“Coach Tan helped us to deal with their spin serve receivings. We had lost to them because of that at Lucknow. Usually one player has the spin serve. Here both of them have it. So they get a continuous stream of points,” Arjun added.

Even when things went into the decider and the Indians trailed 6-11, Arjun says he sensed an opening once sides changed and they got onto the slower end. Though he was personally struggling with his rhythm and poking at the serve, Tan told them to stick it out and stay sturdy. “He told us not to leave the net,” he added. The dribbles turned into acute brushing affairs, as the Indians didn’t back off.

Hari who is considered a future hit because he can play the flat-fast rallies, has a fearless clean defense and jump smashes with aplomb operating in a L shape of the left, said he felt under pressure but the senior Arjun brought composure. “It was a drive-drive game in the end, but we were catching up which put pressure on them,” he told BWF. From 12-16, the Indians made it to 16-16. At 14-16, Hari charged forward for a backhand tap scythe.

On match point, Arjun went after Kang pinning him back, and then in a classic 1-2 Hari finished with a smash kill of his own to Kang.

Just like that, with Coach Tan’s foresight, India had a second men’s doubles pairing at Indonesia Super 1000. “We just wanted to hold our nerves in the first 3 strokes. We knew if we execute that we had a chance,” Arjun told The Indian Express. The dreaded spin-serve was neutralized too, in a span of a famous May-June week.