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All-England: Sindhu in semis; Lakshya beaten in quarters

Last updated on: March 20, 2021 21:36 IST

P V Sindhu

IMAGE: P V Sindhu staged a grand recovery to beat Japan’s Akane Yamaguchi in the quarter-finals of the All England Badminton Championships, in Birmingham, on Friday night. Photograph: Naomi Baker/Getty Images

India's P V Sindhu staged a splendid recovery after losing the first game to get the better of Akane Yamaguchi 16-21, 21-16, 21-19 and enter the semi-finals of the All England Badminton Championships, in Birmingham, on Friday night.

 

The Rio Olympics silver medallist committed errors galore in the first game, hitting wide many times, but got her act together in the next two to surprise the No. 5-ranked Japanese. 

The reigning World champion, ranked No. 7, won in 76 minutes.

She will meet sixth seed Ponpawee Chochuwong in Saturday's semi-finals.

Earlier, Lakshya Sen bowed out Championships, going down to the Netherlands' Mark Caljouw in the quarter-finals.

The 19-year-old Indian came up with a splendid display but it was not enough to prevent him doing down 17-21, 21-16, 17-21 after 55 minutes.

On Thursday, Lakshya became the youngest Indian to reach the quarter-finals of the All England Open after beating France's Thomas Rouxel 21-18, 21- 17 in the second-round.

Earlier in the day, the women's doubles pair of Ashwini Ponnappa and N Sikki Reddy bowed out after losing in straight games to Selena Piek and Cheryl Seinen the Netherlands in the quarter-finals.

The world No. 30 Indian pairing went down 22-24, 12-21 to 24th-ranked duo in 39 minutes.

Ashwini and Sikki had defeated 13th ranked Bulgarian sisters Gabriela Stoeva and Stefani Stoeva 21-17, 21-10 in 33 minutes in the second-round match on Thursday night.

The world No. 10 men's doubles pairing of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty, seeded sixth, crashed out of the event after losing 16-21, 21-11, 17-21 to Denmark's Kim Astrup and Anders Skaarup Rasmussen in the second round.

It was their second consecutive defeat against the world number 13 combine, having lost to them at Swiss Open earlier this month.

In the men's singles, Sameer Verma too suffered a second successive defeat to third seed Anders Antonsen of Denmark, losing 22-20, 21-10 in the second round.

The mixed pairing of Dhruv Kapila and Meghana Jakkampudi also bowed out after losing 19-21, 8-21 to Niclas Nohr and Amalie Magelund of Denmark.