In what turned out to be an abysmal day for the Indians at the All England Badminton Championships, PV Sindhu and Saina Nehwal got knocked out in the quarter finals, ending India’s challenge at the world’s oldest badminton tournament.
PV Sindhu, the 6th seed was up against her arch rival and 3rd seed Tai Tzu Ying. Tai already had a superior head to head record against Sindhu(5-3) and did not put a foot wrong in the quarter final, completely outplaying Sindhu to win the encounter 21-14, 21-10 in a mere 34 minutes.
Sindhu looked completely out of sorts and was unable to cope with Tai’s drop shots all through the match. Also, this is Tai’s 3rd consecutive win against Sindhu. Sindhu will need to sort out Tai’s gameplan or else it could be very tough for her to go through her in the remaining Super series.
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Saina Nehwal on the other hand had a very very close encounter with Sung Ji Hyun, despite going down in straight sets. Saina lost the contest 20-22, 20-22 in two gruelling sets of badminton.
Saina looked to be in the contest all through, but couldn’t really produce the goods at important junctures, and hence had to succumb to a quarter final loss at the Barclaycard Arena.
This was Sung’s second win in 8 games against Sindhu!
No women shuttler from India has ever won the All England Badminton Championship, and only two Indians have managed to win the oldest ever badminton tournament, Prakash Padukone and P Gopichand.
It would be very heartening for P.Gopichand to see one of his pupils make it to the podium next year.
