18-year-old P.V. Sindhu is the first female from India to win a medal in World Badminton Championship 2013 being held in Guangzhou. She has entered in the semifinal of the championship and with this it is confirmed that India will have a bronze medal.
Sindhu is also only third badminton player to win a medal in World Badminton Championship. Prakash Padukone won the men's singles bronze in 1983 while Jwala Gutta and Ashwini Ponnappa won bronze in women's doubles in 2011.
Tenth seeded Sindhu defeated former World No.1 Shixian Wang in the quarter final to enter in the semis. Sindhu led from the start in the first game and rushed away to a 10-5 lead. Though Shixian clawed back to make it 12-13, Sindhu ensured that she never surrendered the lead. At the end Sindhu sealed the game with a gap of 3 points.
Sindhu will now face fourth seeded Ratchanok Intanon of Thailand in the semifinal.
In a post match press conference Sindhi said, "I am very happy that everything went according to the plan. It is great to win a medal in my very first World Championship appearance but I want to now concentrate on tomorrow’s match and not allow myself to relax".
Saina Nehwal and Parupalli Kashyap who were also fighting to book a birth in semis lost their respective matches.
Saina lost the match to 13th seeded South Korean Yeon Ju Bae while Kashyap lost men's singles to Chinese World No.3 Pengyu Du.
Sindhu had defeated defending champion Yihan Wang of China on Thursday by 21-18, 21-17 in women's singles quarterfinal. She took just 55 minutes to knock out the seventh seeded Wang.
|
|
Comments:
