Tokyo: Rio Olympic silver medalist and world champion PV Sindhu delivered a prestigious performance by defeating Mia Blichfeldt of Denmark in a one-sided pre-quarterfinal bout of the women’s singles badminton event at the Tokyo Olympics here on Thursday. Beating in the game made it to the last eight. Sixth seed Sindhu defeated Miya 21-15, 21-13 in a 41-minute match at the Musashino Forest Sports Plaza.
This is Sindhu’s fifth win in six matches against world number 12 from Denmark. The Indian player had to face the only defeat against Miya in the Thailand Open this year. Sindhu, who is challenging to become the first Indian woman to win two individual Olympic medals, will face the winner of the fourth-seeded Akane Yamaguchi of Japan and 12th seed Kim Nguyen of Korea in the quarterfinals.
Sindhu said after the match, “In the first game I started well but I lost some points around 15-16 because I was in a hurry with the defense. My coach told me that I was playing the wrong way and I felt it too. I immediately changed my strategy and won the first game.”
“I did well in the second game, I held the lead and finished the match,” he said. Sixth seed Sindhu played brilliantly from the start. He showed great speed and movement and troubled Mia a lot with his smashes and cross-court returns. Sindhu’s dominance was also seen in long rallies. Mia made very easy mistakes. She troubled Sindhu with her powerful smashes but also gave the world number seven a chance to get out of the pressure by hitting several shots out.
Sindhu lost the first two points against Miya but then went on to take a 4-2 lead with four consecutive points. Miya was finding it difficult to pick up Sindhu’s return while she also hit a few outside shots to take Sindhu’s lead 8-4. Sindhu was leading 11-6 at the break. Sindhu extended her lead to 13-6 but Miya made the score 11-13 with five consecutive points. Sindhu took a 16-12 lead but Miya cut the score 15-16 with two powerful smashes and drop shots to limit the Indian’s lead to just one point.
Mia, however, then struck out three shots and entangled a net as Sindhu went on to win the first game 21-15 in 22 minutes. In the second game, Sindhu looked dominant from the start. They took a 5-0 lead with five consecutive points. Mia, meanwhile, made mistakes on her serve but managed to make some comebacks to 6-9. Sindhu, however, collected points from two consecutive cross-court returns to take an 11-6 lead till the break. Sindhu’s returns were excellent but she also made some spontaneous mistakes in the middle and hit the nets. Sindhu, however, managed to continue to dominate the rally to take a 16-10 lead.
Sindhu got nine match points with four consecutive points at 16-11. Miya saved two match points but Sindhu won the match with a cross-court drop shot. Sindhu is India’s only hope in badminton. B Sai Praneeth crashed out after losing both his group matches in men’s singles while men’s doubles pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty failed to make it to the knockouts despite winning two of their three group matches.
