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Tie No. 15 of the Premier Badminton League (PBL) 2018 presents an uphill task for the defending champions Chennai Smashers as they take on the in-form Ahmedabad Smash Masters at the Jawaharlal Nehru Indoor Stadium in Chennai on Saturday. PV Sindhu leads the Chennai brigade while the World No. 1 Tai Tzu Ying is the biggest star of the Ahmedabad franchise.
Surely, all the focus will be on the women's singles clash tonight. They two faced off in the Hong Kong Open final as recently as November. Even though Sindhu did put up a gallant fight, she still could not manage to sneak a game from the Chinese Taipei ace. And Tai has been in irrepressible form at the PBL 2018. So, it would be quite a challenge for the World Championships silver medallist to register a win, but one should never count her out.
The Smash Masters also have the services of the national champion HS Prannoy, who is currently on a 10-match winning streak at the PBL and even prevailed over the World No. 3 Kidambi Srikanth in his last match.
The Smashers' Brice Leverdez and Tanongsak thus have a stern test ahead in men's singles. Chennai would also be weakened by the absence of their star mixed doubles player, Gabrielle Adcock. The English shuttler suffered an ankle injury during Chennai's last outing and the team had to concede the match and ultimately lost the tie to the Delhi Dashers.
Ahmedabad too are coming off a narrow defeat to the Awadhe Warriors, but with Tai and Prannoy in their squad, they look stronger of the two teams.
Here is all the information you need to know
Tournament name: Premier Badminton League Season 3
Venue: Jawaharlal Nehru Indoor Stadium, Chennai
Date: Saturday, January 6, 2018
Time: Ahmedabad Smash Masters vs Chennai Smashers at 7pm IST
Channel: Star Sports 1/Star Sports 1 HD
Livestream information: Star Sports Hotstar
The squads:
Chennai Smashers - Tanongsak Saensomboonsuk, Brice Leverdez, Aditya Joshi, Daniel Farid, PV Sindhu, Vrushali Gummadi, Yang Lee, B Sumeeth Reddy, Chris Adcock, Gabrielle Adcock (won't continue).
Ahmedabad Smash Masters - HS Prannoy, Sourabh Verma, Siril Verma, Tai Tzu Ying, Sri Krishna Priya Kudaravalli, Law Cheuk Him, Lee Chun Hei Reginald, K Nandagopal, Kamilla Rytter Juhl, Stefani Stoeva.
