Teen sensation P V Sindhu advanced to the quarterfinals with a straight-game win in women's singles but it was young Indian shuttler Kidambi Srikanth, who created a flutter at the USD 300,000 Singapore Super Series with a stunning victory over world number 10 Tien Minh Nguyen of Vietnam, here today.
The 18-year-old Sindhu, who won the Malaysia Open and Macau Open last year besides the prestigious World Championship bronze, prevailed over Japan's Shizuka Uchida 21-17 17-21 21-16 in a women's singles match. The Indian will next take on World No. 3 Yihan Wang tomorrow.
After three first round exits in the All England, Swiss Open and India Super Series, Srikanth finally got his form back as he notched up an upset 18-21 21-15 21-8 win over the world championship bronze medallist.
Thailand Open champion, Srikanth, who was the finalist at the India Grand Prix Gold earlier this year, will next take on Hong Kong's Yun Hu in the quarterfinals tomorrow. The Indian has a 1-0 record against Hu, having beaten him at the Maybank Malaysia Open early in the season.
In the men's doubles competition, Alwin Franchis and Arun Vishnu were humbled by the top seeded Indonesian combo of Mohammad Ahsan and Hendra Setiawan 21-17 24-22.
Another Indian pair of Arun Vishnu and Aparna Balan, too, failed to cross the second round hurdle, as they went down fighting 21-23 17-21 to Gideon Markus Fernaldi and Rizki Amelia Pradipta of Indonesia in the mixed doubles event.
Parupalli Kashyap, who rose to the 19th place today in BWF ranking, suffered a close 16-21 21-15 22-20 defeat to World No. 35 Dong Keun Lee of Korea in the men's singles competition yesterday.
In the women's singles competition, Sindhu was 11-10 ahead at the first interval and the Indian kept the pressure on the world number 113 Japanese Shizuka even after the break as she moved from 14-10 to 19-14 before pocketing the game.
In the second game, Uchida turned the tables after an early fight to lead 11-8, but Sindhu clawed back at 13-13. The Japanese, however, was not yet done as she again drew parity at 16-16 and then reeled off four points to take the match to the decider.
In the deciding game, Sindhu led 15-11 midway. But the Japanese brought down the lead to 16-18 before Sindhu decided to march away with the remaining three points to seal the issue.
