- Saturday, November 23, 2024
By: Shubham Ghosh
RIO Olympic silver-medallist PV Sindhu on Thursday (29) defeated Denmark’s Mia Blichfeldt to enter the quarterfinals of the women’s singles tournament at the Tokyo Olympics.
The ace Indian shuttler took 41 minutes to tame his European opponent at the Mushashino Forest Plaza, Tokyo, and the scores read 21-15, 21-13.
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The world No.7 will now face Japan’s Akane Yamaguchi, who beat Korea’s Kim Ga-eun in another game in the round of 16. Yamaguchi is ranked fifth in the world, two places above Sindhu, the current world champion.
Sindhu smashes her way into last 16
Sindhu was energetic in her game against Blichfeldt as her loud roars reverberated through the empty stands at the venue. She started slowly in both her games against low-ranked opponents in the group stage but against Blichfeldt, ranked 12, she switched on from the very start.
Sindhu had spoken about the aggressive play of Blichfeldt on the eve of the match. The two shuttlers met this year twice and the Dane beat Sindhu at Thailand Open in Tokyo before the tall Indian avenged that defeat in the Swiss Open.
In Thursday’s game, Sidhu was found to be making some wonderful moves on the court and mixing things up well to take a 11-6 lead in the first game. She was troubled for a while by Blichfeldt who won five straight points to make it 11-13 in the first game but Sindhu raised her game at the right moment to end the first game in 22 minutes.
In the second game, the Indian raced to a 5-0 lead in no time and despite the Dane pulling things back a little, the Rio medallist had the last laugh eventually.
