PV Sindhu and Kidambi Srikanth notched up contrasting wins to progress to the third round of the badminton world championships in Nanjing, China, on Wednesday. However, world no 11 H S Prannoy suffered a shock defeat to unseeded Brazilian Ygor Coelho to bow out.
Olympic silver medallist Sindhu, who had got a bye in the first round, opened her campaign with an easy 21-14, 21-9 win over Indonesia’s Fitriani.
Sindhu dished out a dominating game and was always in control of the match. Her superior court coverage and accuracy in strokes made life difficult for the Indonesian.
In the opening game, Sindhu lead 11-7 at the break, before moving to 17-7 with six straight points. She eventually comfortably pocketed the opening game when Fitriani sent the shuttle long.
In the second game, Sindhu continued to surge ahead, moving from 4-5 behind to 8-3 before entering the interval with a 11-5 advantage.
The Indian didn’t give Fitriani any chance to make a comeback and quickly wrapped the match when the Indonesia found the net.
The 23-year-old Indian, who won the silver medal last year, will face Korea’s Sung Ji Hyun, a 2015 world championship bronze medallist, in the next round.
Srikanth survives scare
Srikanth needed over an hour to finally get past the world No 48, who is eight years his senior, 21-15, 12-21, 21-14.
Both players traded the early points before Srikanth managed to break away after the first interval, taking the first game rather comfortably. However, Abian put up a spirited challenge in the second game, putting forward his A-game which mixed good defence with attack that caught Srikanth on the backfoot.
As Abian gained confidence, Srikanth began committing a slew of unforced errors after the interval of the second game and allowed the Spaniard to win seven points in a row from 12-10 and eventually take the match into a decider.
Srikanth was able to regain his composure during the switch of ends and tightened up his game as the decider began. A bunch of spectacular long rallies followed, the points of which were exchanged between the two. In one of the more memorable ones, Abian had Srikanth diving to his left, then right, then again left before the Spaniard won the point that gave him a 10-7 lead. Suddenly, the match was in upset territory.
However, the former world No 1 was able to dig into his tank after the final switch of ends, unleashing three back-to-back unplayable smashes that allowed him to retake the lead at 14-12. It was then Abian’s turn to get nervous and commit errors, as Srikanth won seven of the next nine points to seal the match.
“I started off well but made too many mistakes in the second game,” Srikanth said. “I was trying too many things and couldn’t get going. May be the strategy I tried, I tried too many things and it didn’t come off and I have to talk to my coach about it.”
He added, “I should have avoided doing mistakes in the second game and I am concerned about that. The last 10 points, I got everything right. So hope to get things right in the next match.” Srikanth will next take on Malaysia’s Daren Liew in the third round on Thursday.
Prannoy’s defence fails him
Prannoy, seeded 11th, couldn’t hold on to the momentum after breezing through the opening game to eventually lose 21-8, 16-21, 15-21 to Coelho, ranked 39th in the world.
Prannoy’s loss came as a huge shock, especially considering how comfortably he won the first game. Coelho came back stronger in the second game and took an early 7-1 lead, which Prannoy was able to eventually close down to 15-15. But the Brazilian broke away again, taking the second game 21-16 to force a decider.
The deciding game was tight till the scores were tied 11-11, but again Coelho was able to pull away after that to win the match and send the world No 11 crashing out.
After a forgettable outing, Prannoy admitted his mistakes and said he needed to bounce back quickly from this defeat ahead of the Asian Games.
“I was trying to do something in the second and third game but it wasn’t working. He was retrieving everything and my defence was bad today. I gave him a lot of chances for a free dribble and hit and that made him comfortable,” he said.
“I felt I was playing good in the first game. The start of the second game was crucial and I gave him a lead. The lead gave him confidence and that was a big mistake. I think it’s one match I need to forget as soon as possible and get back to work,” he added.
B Sai Praneeth also entered the next round after dumping Spain’s Lus Enrique Penalver 21-18, 21-11 to set up a meeting with Denmark’s Hans-Kristian Solberg Vittinghus. However, Sameer Verma was no match for five-time champion Lin Dan. The Chinese won in straight games 21-17, 21-14.
Bad day for doubles pairs
It turned out to be a disastrous day for the Indian doubles pairs as well, as all of them lost their respective matches to crash out of the prestigious tournament.
Commonwealth Games silver medallists Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty did all the hard work but couldn’t go the full distance, losing narrowly 18-21, 21-15, 16-21 to world no 8 pair of Kim Astrup and Anders Skaarup Rasmussen from Denmark.
Ashwini Ponnapa and N Sikki Reddy were no match for second seeded Japanese combination of Yuki Fukushima and Sayaka Hirota, going down 14-21, 15-21 in the second round.
National champions Manu Attri and B Sumeeth Reddy waged a gallant battle before losing 24-22, 13-21, 16-21 to seventh seed Takuto Inoue and Yuki Kaneko of Japan in men’s doubles.
With inputs from PTI
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