Star shuttlers PV Sindhu and Kidambi Srikanth registered contrasting victories to advance to the second round of the Indonesia Open Super 1000 badminton tournament in Jakarta on Wednesday.
World Championship silver medallist Sindhu had to fight back from a game down to beat Japan’s Aya Ohori 11-21, 21-15, 21-15 while former champion Srikanth thrashed Kenta Nishimoto 21-14, 21-13 in just 38 minutes.
Sindhu, who has been struggling for consistency this year, struggled with the drift in the opening game and the numerous unforced errors meant that Ohori raced through to draw first blood. However, the Indian was much more composed after change of ends as she opened up a 6-2 lead and then dominated the proceedings to force a decider.
In the third and final game, Sindhu knew exactly what was needed to score points from the difficult side of the court and once she had taken a 11-6 lead at the mid-game interval, she only had to concentrate on not making mistakes to book her second round berth in 59 minutes. She will now face the winner of the match between Mia Blichfeldt and Yip Pui Yin for a berth in the quarter-finals.
Earlier, Srikanth made a strong start to his campaign as he hit the court running, opening up a 6-0 lead in the opening game and though Nishimoto tried to fight back, the Japanese was always chasing the game. The second game was a closer affair till 7-6 in the favour of the Indian, who then ran through the next few points to ease into the second round, where the eighth seed will face the winner of the match between Brice Leverdez and Ng Ka Long Angus.
However, there was disappointment in store of B Sai Praneeth as he went down 21-15, 13-21, 21-10 against Wing Ki Vincent Wong of Hong Kong.
Men’s singles player HS Prannoy fought hard and had the lead several times before going down to world No 2 Shi Yu Qi. The Indian lost 21-19 18-21 20-22 after a tough battle that lasted over 70 minutes.
Siril upsets Sirant in Russia
It was also a good day in office for Indian shuttlers in the Russian Open Super 100 event in Vladivostok as most of them advanced to the next round.
Former junior world No 1 Siril Verma let the Indian charge with an upset win over eighth seed Sergey Sirant of Russia 21-15, 12-21, 21-11 while top seed Subhankar Dey needed just 23 minutes to beat England’s Hin Shun Wong 21-10, 21-6 in the second round.
In the women’s singles category, former national champion Rituparna Das defeated Singapore’s Chua Hui Zen Grace 21-12, 21-8 while G Vrushali hammered Russia’s Alina Kurguzova 21-8, 21-9 in the first round.