Sindhu, Srikanth advance into pre-quarterfinals of Badminton World Championships; Prannoy bows out

Top Indian shuttlers PV Sindhu and Kidambi Srikanth progressed into the pre-quarterfinals but it was curtains for HS Prannoy, who suffered an early exit after a shock defeat to qualifier Ygor Coelho of Brazil at the Badminton World Championships in Nanjing on Wednesday.

Both advanced but with contrasting victories. Olympic silver-medalist Sindhu, who got a first-round bye, hardly broke a sweat on her way to a comfortable 21-14, 21-9, victory over Indonesia’s Vitrani. Fifth-seeded Srikanth, however, had to overcome the resistance of Pablo Abian in a 62-minute match, which he eventually won 21-15, 12-21, 21-14 to progress into the pre-quarterfinals.

World No. 6 Srikanth had a slow start falling 2-4 behind but soon picked himself up to race to 11-9 at the break. He extended it to 16-13 and from there won four consecutive points to pocket the opening set. Abian, however, bounced back in the second set and increased the advantage from a 6-3 lead to 11-7 at the mid-game break. The Indian tried his best and decreased the deficit to 10-12, but the Spaniard recorded seven straight points to win the set and take the game into the decider.

In the deciding set, both the shuttlers went toe-on-toe but from 6-6, Abian burst ahead to 11-9 at the break. Srikanth though looked a different class on return and moved to a 13-12 lead before registering a 21-14 victory.

Srikanth will next face the former World No. 10 Malaysia’s Daren Liew, while Sindhu will take on Sung Ji Hyun of Korea in the last 16.

Also Read: Sheldon Cottrell bowls most unusual no ball in history of cricket

B Sai Praneeth also entered the next round after outclassing Spaniard Luís Enrique Penalver 21-18 21-11 in straight sets and will face Denmark’s Hans-Kristian Solberg Vittinghus.

The story was however not the same for the Indian double pairs all of whom were knocked out of the competition after losing their respective matches. Commonwealth Games runner-up Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty put up a brave fight but failed to cross the line, losing 18-21 21-15 16-21 narrowly to the Danish pair of Kim Astrup and Anders Skaarup Rasmussen.

National champions Manu Attri and B Sumeeth Reddy similarly fought valiantly but suffered a 24-22 13-21 16-21 defeat to the seventh-seeded pair of Takuto Inoue and Yuki Kaneko of Japan in men’s doubles category.

Ashwini Ponnapa and N Sikki Reddy, however, failed to match the second-seeded Japanese combo of Yuki Fukushima and Sayaka Hirota suffering 14-21 15-21 to exit the tournament.