All England Championship: Sindhu in semis, Srikanth falters

Birmingham: Olympic silver medallist shuttler P.V. Sindhu produced a top-notched performance to eke out a thrilling three-game victory over 2016 champion Nozomi Okuhara of Japan to progress to her maiden semi-final at the All England Championship here on Friday.

Sindhu outwitted Okuhara 20-22, 21-18, 21-18 in a battle that lasted an hour and 24 minutes.

With this victory, Sindhu registered her fifth win over the world no. 6 Japanese, who robbed her of a World Championship gold at Glasgow after a 110 minute marathon battle.

Earlier, H.S. Prannoy progressed to the quarter-finals but title contender Kidambi Srikanth lost to China’s Huang Yuxiang.

The unseeded Prannoy, who came into the tournament after recovering from foot warts, outwitted former world no. 3 and 2014 world championship bronze medallist Tommy Sugiarto of Indonesia 21-10, 21-19 in a pre-quarterfinal match.

The world no. 3 had defeated Yuxiang, ranked 42, to claim the 2016 Syed Modi Grand Prix Gold title but Srikanth failed to see off the unseeded Chinese at the Arena Birmingham, losing 11-21, 21-15, 20-22, in a 52 minute battle.

Prannoy, who slipped to world no. 16 after missing a few tournaments earlier in the year, will now face Huang in the quarters.

India’s rising doubles pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty played their hearts out before losing to the second seeded Danish combo of Mathias Boe and Carsten Mogensen 21-16, 16-21, 23-21 in an hour and three minutes.

In mixed doubles, Pranaav Jerry Chopra and N. Sikki Reddy failed to put up a fight against second seeds Wang Yilyu and Huang Dongping of China, losing 6-21, 10-21 in just 24 minutes.

Lee, Lin face off in quarter-final
Lee Chong Wei battled through a gruelling three-game contest to set up a mouthwatering quarter-final against Lin Dan.

South Korea’s Lee Dong-keun pushed four-time All England winner Lee all the way but the Malaysian superstar eventually came out on top 21-6, 13-21, 21-18 and will face six-time champion Lin on Friday in the latest chapter in their storied rivalry.

China’s Lin reached the last eight with a 21-13, 23-21 win against Taiwan’s Wang Tzu-wei.

In the women’s draw, Spain’s Carolina Marin took another step towards repeating her 2015 title win with a 21-13, 21-17 victory over Japan’s Saena Kawakami.