Indonesia Open 2018: PV Sindhu and HS Prannoy enter quarter-finals; Saina Nehwal exits

PV Sindhu’s 23rd birthday turned out to be a very sweet one as the India No. 1 women’s singles shuttler made her way through to the quarter-finals of the $1,250,000 Indonesia Open held at the Istora Gelora Bung Karno in Jakarta, Indonesia on Thursday. Joining her in the last-eight was HS Prannoy as Saina Nehwal and Sameer Verma crashed out of this Super 1000 tournament.

The third seeded Sindhu needed just 36 minutes to get the better of World No. 17 Aya Ohori of Japan in the second round clash. This was Sindhu’s fourth victory over the young Japanese in four career meetings.

The Rio Olympic silver medallist thus continues her fine form from last week’s Malaysia Open, where she made it to the semi-finals.

Next up for her is the eighth seeded He Bingjiao. The Chinese has always been a tough opponent for the Indian and the two are tied at 5-5 in their head-to-head meetings.

A year after riding on a giant-killing run to reach the semi-finals, HS Prannoy has made it to the quarter-finals of the Indonesia Open. The eighth seed stormed back from a game down to notch up a 21-23, 21-15, 21-13 win over World No. 17 Wang Tzu Wei in exactly an hour.

Prannoy has begun his campaign this year by knocking out the two-time Olympic champion Lin Dan. Up next for him is a tough challenge as he takes on the reigning All England Open champion Shi Yuqi.

Former three-time champion Saina Nehwal failed to repeat her Indonesia Masters heroics over Chen Yufei and went down 18-21, 15-21 in 41 minutes. Earlier in January, the Commonwealth Games gold medallist had beaten the Chinese in a gruelling three-game encounter.

Swiss Open champion Sameer Verma couldn’t put up much resistance against the top seed and World No. 1 Viktor Axelsen. The Dane pulled off a 21-15, 21-14 win in just 39 minutes.