World No. 13 Joshna Chinappa, who is the last Indian standing at the $25,000 MEML HKFC International 2016, delighted Indian fans at this Hong Kong tournament by reaching her career’s biggest ever PSA final on Friday. And it did not come easy! The third seed showed a lot of resilience to carve out an 8-11, 11-9, 12-10, 7-11, 11-9 victory over the World No. 10 and defending champion Annie Au of Hong Kong.
The 29-year-old Indian national champion had defeated Au at the Asian Squash Team Championships just a few days back and the experience surely came in handy. She was narrowly edged by the second seed and home favourite in the first game of the match but came up with a big response to take the next two games narrowly.
However, the 27-year-old southpaw was not one to go down so easily. Buoyed by the crowd support, she stormed back to grab the fourth game 11-7. With the momentum on Au’s side, the pressure was then all on Joshna’s shoulders to try and stop Au from running away with the decider.
And she managed to do just that! She was close on the heels of the local player even though Au had a slim lead of 8-6 deep in the fifth game. But Joshna made one last push and with an incredible show of determination, she was able to grab the win in exactly 1 hour.
The Indian was understandably elated after such a big achievement. “Every point was fought to the max, just happy to get through to my biggest ever PSA final,” said the Chennai girl.
Joshna to meet top seed in final
She will next meet the top seed Joelle King who beat the eighth seed Donna Urquhart 11-8, 10-12, 11-6, 11-6 in the other semi-final. The two last met in the second round of the Hong Kong Open in December where Chinappa went down in a gruelling five-game match.
Earlier, sixth seed Dipika Pallikal had bowed out to King in the quarter-finals.
