Guwahati: Indian shuttler P V Sindhu, who is a two-time Olympic medalist, came back from a game down to defeat South Korean Sim Yujin and entered into the semi-finals of the Indonesia Open Super 1000 competition in Bali.
Third seed Sindhu, the reigning world champion, had to toil hard to beat Yujin 14-21 21-19 21-14 in the quarterfinal match that lasted an hour and six minutes.
In the USD 850,000 event, the Indian will now face the winner of the other quarterfinal match between Japan’s Asuka Takahashi and Thailand’s second seed Ratchanok Intanon.
B Sai Praneeth of India will face Olympic champion and former world No.1 Viktor Axelsen of Denmark in the men’s singles quarterfinals later in the day.
Praneeth, world no.16, defeated France’s world no. 70 Christo Popov in a gruelling second-round match on Thursday, winning 21-17 14-21 21-19.
The Indian challenge is also present in the men’s doubles event, where the sixth-seeded pairing of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty, ranked 11, will face the Malaysian pairing of Goh Sze Fei and Nur Izzuddin in the quarterfinals later on Friday.
In the decider, Sindhu managed the early exchanges to sprint to an 11-4 lead, but the Japanese rallied for seven consecutive points to even the score at 11-11.
Sensing difficulties, Sindhu pushed her game to the next level just in time to outwit her opponent and win the match.
