Indonesia Masters: PV Sindhu, Kidambi Srikanth progress to quarters

Prannoy stuns Olympic champion

BALI: India's shuttlers PV Sindhu, Kidambi Srikanth and HS Prannoy registered similar come-from-behind victories in their respective events to advance to the quarter-finals of the Indonesia Masters Super 750 badminton tournament, in Bali, on Thursday.

The highlight of the day was Prannoy's stunning 14-21, 21-19, 21-16 upset victory over Tokyo Olympics gold medallist Victor Axelsen in a tense one hour 11 minutes battle in the the men's singles second round.

Down and out in the first game, Prannoy made a sensational recovery to first level the match and then eke out a memorable win against the World No. 2.

This was Prannoy's first victory in six attempts against Axelsen. With the win, the World No 32 Indian shuttler becomes the first player to beat the Dane in full a match since March.

In the women's singles, reining wold champion Sindhu, who is seeded third, took 47 minutes to record a 17-21, 21-7, 21-12 win over Spain's Clara Azurmendi.

Playing against the World No 47 Azurmendi for the first time, Sindhu went down in the first game before putting up a dominant performance in the next two games to register a brilliant victory.

The two-time Olympic medallist will now lock horns against unseeded Turkish shuttler Neslihan Yigit in the quarter-finals. Sindhu has a 3-0 head-to-head record against the Turkish.

On the other hand, Srikanth, outclassed Indonesia's sixth seed Jonatan Christie 13-21, 21-18, 21-15 in one hour two minutes in the men's singles second round fixture.

The unseeded Srikanth, who had claimed the Indonesia Open Super Series premier in 2017 at Jakarta, will take on Prannoy in an all-Indian quarter-final.

However, it was curtains for young Lakshya Sen the men's singles event and the mixed doubles pairing of Dhruv Kapila and N Sikki Reddy.

The 20-year-old Lakshya, who had reached the semi-finals at Hylo Open Super 500 and final of Dutch Open recently, went down 13-21, 19-21 to the top seed and two-time World champion Kento Momota of Japan in a 46-minute clash.

Kapila and Sikki, on the other hand, lost a hard fought 15-21, 23-21, 18-21 battle to Thai duo of Supak Jomkoh and Supissara Paewsampran in the second round mixed doubles match.

The women's doubles pairing of Ashwini Ponappa and N Sikki Reddy also crashed out of the event in the second round third seeds Jongkolphan Kititharakul and Rawinda Prajongjai 18-21, 12-21. Agencies

Also Read: PV Sindhu, Lakshya advance in Indonesia Masters

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