Bangkok: Indian shuttlers PV Sindhu and Sameer Verma stormed into the quarterfinals of the Toyota Thailand Open badminton tournament. Both of them registered straight-game wins but HS Prannoy bowed out of Super 1000 tournament here Tuesday. It should be stated here that Sindhu had lost in the first round in the event leading to this tournament.
Olympic silver medallist Sindhu expectedly outclassed Malaysia’s World No 92 Kisona Selvaduray 21-10, 21-12 in a lop-sided second-round contest that lasted just 35 minutes. She will face either Thailand’s Ratchanok Inthanon or Korea’s Sung Ji Hyun next. It will surely be a tough match for Sindhu.
“The first game was pretty easy and in the second, I had to play with the wind and really control my strokes. I made some simple errors in the second game. I should not have made them at all. There was too much wind in the second game and I was being careful,” Sindhu said after the match.
“I was remembering last week’s tournament and each point was really important for me. We all win and lose, so I took last week in a really positive way. I came in much stronger this week. Overall, it’s a good win and I’m really looking forward to the next round,” Sindhu added.
World No. 31 Sameer also continued his impressive run, stunning World No. 17 Rasmus Gemke 21-12, 21-9 in just 39 minutes for his third victory over the Danish player. Sameer will now face third seed Anders Antonsen of Denmark, who received a walkover, in the quarterfinals.
The mixed doubles pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Ashwini Ponnappa also made it to the quarterfinals with a stunning 22-20, 14-21 21-16 win over World No. 17 German duo of Mark Lamsfuss and Isabel Herttrich in a match that lasted close to an hour.
Satwiksairaj also paired up with Chirag Shetty in the men’s doubles to notch up an upset 21-18, 23-21 win over seventh seeds Korean combination of Choi Solgyu and Seo Seung Jae.
Prannoy, however, failed to cross the second round hurdle, going down 17-21, 18-21.
