On a day that saw the end of the road for most of the top seeds and her major challengers falling by the wayside to many lower-ranked opponents, PV Sindhu had to dig deep and bring all her experience before registering a hard-fought 21-10, 12-21, 21-15 win against Ira Sharma to ensure her spot in the quarterfinals of the Syed Modi International Super 300 here on Thursday.
As and when she decides to hang up her racket for good, Sindhu will be hoping to be ready with a new generation of players with a similar resolve to carry on her legacy through her academy in Visakhapatnam. “I want players to be inspired and get access to good facilities and coaching so that they can develop further.
“We have plenty of talented players in India, they only need good training to do well for the state and the country. As a player myself, I know the needs of a player, especially when they are young and coming up and will try to groom them to the best of my ability. My aim is to create many more Sindhus,” she said.
The two-time Olympic medalist is the only seeded player remaining in the competition, but the win did not come easy against the 147-ranked Ira, who rode on luck and pluck to almost pull off the biggest upset of the tournament. After breezing through the first game without breaking a sweat, Sindhu seemed to lose not just her control on the game but also her strokes. She kept hitting wide, failed to read the position of the shuttle and seemed unable to move across the court.
Ira raced to an 11-1 lead, and every time Sindhu got the serve back, she appeared unsure of whether to attack or defend and kept smashing into the net. A couple of close calls too went against her as her 24-year-old opponent kept growing in confidence with every point. The decider was much closer, and while Sindhu was much more in control, Ira, to her credit, never gave away easy points to the senior pro. A change of racket at 14-all finally changed Sindhu’s arc too as she reeled off seven points straight to take the game and the match.
“I made a lot of mistakes, simple unforced errors and gave her easy points. I think I gave her a huge lead in the 2nd game, and it shouldn’t have happened, but overall it was good. There are times when you try everything and nothing works out, it was one of those days. I was not able to connect properly, sometimes the shuttle was hitting the frame for both of us, there were no big rallies, mostly 2-3 strokes only,” Sindhu said.
Having got Lee Hyun-il as part of her coaching staff, Sindhu appreciated the South Korean’s role. “Lee has been really good. It’s always nice to understand and experience a coach and player’s relationship, and he’s always giving me his inputs. It’s only for this season for now, but let’s see,” she said.
On the other courts, upsets were the order of the day. Talented youngster Unnati Hooda beat Thailand’s 4th seed Pornpicha Choeikeewong 21-18, 22-20, 17-year old Shriyanshi Valishetty added 2nd seed Malvika Bansod to her higher-ranked scalps with a 21-12, 21-15 win and Tasnim Mir sent 5th seed Anupama Upadhyaya packing in three games 21-15, 13-21, 21-7.
On the men’s side, Lakshya Sen had a contrasting outing, outplaying Israel’s Daniil Dubovenko 21-14, 21-13 in just 35 minutes to move into the last eight. Priyanshu Rajawat joined him in the quarterfinals with a 21-15, 21-8 win against Vietnam’s Le Duc Phat, but 3rd seed Kiran George faltered after a good start, squandering two match points at 20-18 in the 2nd game before losing to Japan’s Shogo Ogawa 19-21, 22-20, 21-11.
Talented Manipur shuttler Meiraba Luwang Maisnam beat 6th seed Nhat Nguyen of Ireland 21-15, 21-13, and there was more bad news in doubles with the top-seeded pair of B. Sumeeth Reddy and Sikki Reddy going down 21-19, 16-21, 13-21 to the Thai pair of Bing Kun Loo and Lo Ee Ho in mixed doubles.
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