Jwala Gutta and Ashwini Ponnappa lose in semi-final, settle for bronze at Asian Badminton Championships

Gimcheon (South Korea), April 26 (IANS) The Indian challenge came to an end on the penultimate day of the $200,000 Badminton Asia Championships as P.V. Sindhu and women’s doubles pair Jwala Gutta and Ashwini Ponnappa all settled for bronze medals as they lost their semi-finals to Chinese players here Saturday.

After securing the women’s singles bronze by qualifying for the last four Friday, the 18-year-old Sindhu went down to World No.2 and arch rival Shixian Wang in a marathon match which lasted an hour and 18 minutes.

The World No.10 started the encounter on a positive note by clinching the first game 21-15. The second game went right till the end and Sindhu had victory in her sights but Shixian wasn’t going to give it away easily and went on to level the match by winning the game 22-20.

Once the Indian lost the second game, the third one was completely dominated by the 2010 Asian Games gold medallist. Shixian raced away to take a big lead and then finished the game 21-12.

With this victory, reigning All-England champion Shixian bettered her career record to 2-3 against the Hyderabadi.

Later in the day, Jwala and Ashwini, who also secured the bronze Friday, went down tamely to Luo Ying and Luo Yu, who dominated in every aspect of the game and clinched the match 21-12, 21-7 in 33 minutes.

This is the World No.10 Chinese combine’s third win in as many matches over the Indian duo.