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It was a bright day for the Indian badminton players as K Srikanth and PV Sindhu made it to the semi-finals of the Super Series 750 tournament played at Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia on Friday. Both shuttler’s won their respective matches in two straight sets.
In the men’s section, Srikanth took on 22nd ranked Brice Leverdez. It was a close fought match as the French player started on a positive note taking an early 8-5 lead but soon Srikanth reversed the trend and levelled the score at 8-8. He continued his aggression and at the interval, had an 11-9 lead. Despite Leverdez coming back to equal scores at 13-13, the Commonwealth Silver medallist showed great composure to win the first set 21-18.
In the second game, both players started taking alternate points till 5-5. Srikanth then showed great domination to score six successive points to lead 11-5 at the interval. After the interval, the Indian shuttler did not allow Brice Leverdez to come back into the game and won it 21-14 to progress into semi-finals. Srikanth will take on Kento Momota in semi-finals on Saturday.
Sindhu took on Carolina Marin in a rematch of Rio Olympic finals showdown. As expected, the match was a closely contested one with both players fighting for each point. Sindhu had a slender lead of 11-10 at the interval. After the interval, the match was swinging from one side to another with both players continued to take alternate points. Marin had a lead of 20-18, but PV Sindhu took four points in succession to win the first set 22-20.
In the second game, the match again started on equal footing till 6-6. PV Sindhu took 5 points in succession thereafter to lead 11-6 at the interval. After the interval, Carolina Marin narrowed the gap but Sindhu held her nerves winning the set 21-19 to progress into the semi-finals. Next up, Sindhu will face World No. 1 Tai Tzu Ying.
