Thinaah Muralitharan

Thinaah Muralitharan (born 3 January 1998) is a Malaysian badminton player. An Olympian, she and Pearly Tan created history by becoming the first ever Malaysian semi-finalists at the women's doubles event at the 2024 Summer Olympics. She won the gold medals at the 2022 Commonwealth Games in the women's doubles with partner Pearly Tan and in the mixed team event.

Career

In 2021, Thinaah and Pearly Tan clinched their first BWF World Tour title at the Swiss Open.

In 2022, Thinaah and Tan claimed the French Open title, becoming the first ever Malaysian women's doubles pair to achieve this feat.

Thinaah and her partner Tan best result in 2023 were finalists in the Malaysia Masters and Hong Kong Open.

Thinaah and Tan became the first ever Malaysian women's doubles pair to advance to the semi-finals of an Olympic Games at the 2024 Paris Olympics. Ranked 13th in the world at the time, they were drawn alongside Chen Qingchen and Jia Yifan from China, Mayu Matsumoto and Wakana Nagahara from Japan, and Apriyani Rahayu and Siti Fadia Silva Ramadhanti from Indonesia, ranked 1st, 6th, and 9th in the world respectively. Having successfully advanced from the group stage with a 2–1 record, they defeated then ranked 7th in the world Kim So-yeong and Kong Hee-yong from Korea in the quarter-finals in straight sets, before falling to Chen and Jia in the semi-finals and Japan's Nami Matsuyama and Chiharu Shida in the bronze medal match.

Thinaah and Tan reached their first final in 2024 at the Korea Open, finished as runner-up to home pair Jeong Na-eun and Kim Hye-jeong.

Personal life

Thinaah is the second child of S. Muralitharan and Parimala Devi Kalalingam. She has an older brother and a younger sister, Selinaah Muralitharan, who is a former Selangor state shuttler. She is fluent in all four main languages spoken in Malaysia: Tamil, Malay, English, and Mandarin, in which she picked up from her ethnic Chinese friends whilst studying at Bukit Jalil Sports School. In October 2024, Thinaah graduated with a Bachelor of Education in Teaching English as a Second Language (TESL) at Open University Malaysia. She was also conferred a special sports icon award during the convocation.

Awards

Honours

Honours of Malaysia

Selangor:
- Bintang Kecemerlangan Sukan Selangor (BKS) (2023)

Achievements

Commonwealth Games

Women's doubles

BWF World Tour (3 titles, 5 runners-up)

The BWF World Tour, which was announced on 19 March 2017 and implemented in 2018, is a series of elite badminton tournaments sanctioned by the Badminton World Federation (BWF). The BWF World Tours are divided into levels of World Tour Finals, Super 1000, Super 750, Super 500, Super 300, and the BWF Tour Super 100.

Women's doubles