K Srikanth loses to Antonsen in semifinal, crashes out of Indonesia Masters

Former world No. 1 Kidambi Srikanth crashed out of the Indonesia masters Super 750 badminton tournament after losing to Danish third-seeded Anders Antonsen 21-14, 21-9 in the men's singles semifinal.

FILE PHOTO: Indian shuttler Kidambi Srikanth in action.

Former world No. 1 Kidambi Srikanth crashed out of the Indonesia masters Super 750 badminton tournament after losing to Danish third-seed Anders Antonsen 21-14, 21-9 in the men's singles semifinal that lasted 41 minutes.

Srikanth was able to hold on Antonsen initially, levelling the scores at 3-3, 4-4, 5-5 before falling behind. Srikanth made another fine recovery in the first game, narrowing down the gap to 12-11 but eventually lost steam.

In the second game also, both were tied at 4-4 but the Dane took eight straight points to zoom to 12-4. The Indian could not recover from there while Antonsen never let his guard down to win the second game and the match.

Earlier, double Olympic medallist PV Sindhu too bowed out after suffering a straight-game defeat in the semifinals against Japanese top seed Akane Yamaguchi.