Tokyo: India’s best bet in badminton, PV Sindhu started her Tokyo Olympics campaign on a rousing note thrashing Israel’s Ksenia Polikarpova 21-7, 21-10 in straight sets in a women’s singles Group J encounter on Sunday.
The 2016 Rio Olympics silver medallist, Sindhu, will next play Hong Kong’s World no. 34 Cheung Ngan Yi in her final group encounter on July 28. The 26-year-old World No.7 started in a dominating fashion but was soon taken aback lagging 3-4 in the first game.
However, the sixth-seed Sindhu quickly grabbed her composure forcing her Polikarpova to make unforced errors grabbing 13 straight points. She made full use of her trademark straight and cross-court smashes and drops to leave no chance for the Israeli shuttler to come back into the match and eventually grab the first game.
𝗢𝗡 𝗔 𝗥𝗢𝗟𝗟 🥳
2016 Rio Olympics 🥈 medalist @Pvsindhu1 starts off her @Tokyo2020 campaign on a brilliant note as she comfortably beats 🇮🇱's Polikarpova 21-7, 21-10 in her first match of Group J 🤩#SmashfortheGlory#badminton#Tokyo2020#Cheer4India#TeamIndia pic.twitter.com/XQt6d5TjnL
— BAI Media (@BAI_Media) July 25, 2021
Sindhu continued her domination in the second game as well over Polikarpova, who was playing with a strapped knee. The Indian led 9-3 at one stage and went into the interval with a massive seven-point advantage. From there it was a matter of time for Sindhu as she ended the match in her usual fashion.
Earlier on Saturday, the Indian men’s doubles pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty shocked the World No.3 duo of Yang Lee and Chi-Lin Wang of Chinese Taipei in a thrilling group A match. Meanwhile, B Sai Praneeth lost his men’s singles Group D match to World No. 47 Misha Zilberman of Israel and need to win his last group encounter to stay in the competition.
