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India’s PV Sindhu made a fine start to her week in Guangzhou, China after scooping up the ‘Best Dressed Female’ award at the BWF Gala Dinner and Awards Night on Monday ahead of the BWF World Tour Finals 2018. China’s All England Open champion Shi Yuqi was adjudged the ‘Best Dressed Male’ player.
This is the first time Sindhu has won in this category. Last year, Kidambi Srikanth was the winner in the ‘Best Dressed Male’ category.
The 23-year-old, who looked stunning in a white attire, has earlier won the ‘Most Improved Player’ award in 2016 after earning the silver medal at the Rio Olympics and the title at the China Open.
Apart from Sindhu, the men’s doubles pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty were the only Indians who had a shot at any award as they were nominated in the ‘Most Improved Player’ section. However, they lost out to Japan’s women’s doubles world champions Mayu Matsumoto and Wakana Nagahara.
The Male Player of the Year, meanwhile, went to Indonesia’s irrepressible World No. 1 men’s doubles duo of Marcus Fernaldi Gideon and Kevin Sanjaya Sukamuljo, who won for the second successive year. The pair won as many as nine titles this year.
Huang Yaqiong, one-half of China’s dominant mixed doubles World No. 1 pair, was deservedly conferred on the ‘Best Female Player of the Year’ award. Yaqiong teamed up with Zheng Siwei to capture nine titles this season.
China had more delight as the young men’s doubles duo of Han Chengkai and Zhou Haodong went on to win the ‘Eddy Choong Most Promising Player of the Year’ award. The former junior world champions triumphed at the French Open this year.
The action at the BWF World Tour Finals starts on Wednesday, December 12, 2018. While Sindhu will be playing at this prestigious season-ender for the third time, Sameer Verma is making his debut this time.
