Birmingham, Mar 15:
Olympic silver medallist P V Sindhu progressed to the quarterfinals of the All England Championship with a hard-fought win over Thailand’s Nitchaon Jindapol in women’s singles, here.
The world No 3 Indian recovered from a mid-way slump to overcome the Thai shuttler 21-13 13-21 21-18 in a match which lasted an hour and seven minutes.
With 2013 champion Ratchanok Inthanon crashing out in the opening round, the onus was on Jindapol to go deep in the tournament and she did produce some superb strokes but Sindhu was always a step ahead.
“I definitely need to improve. I am happy to pull off a tough match. I hope I would go back , recover and come back stronger tomorrow. I am not thinking too much about the tournament. Most probably, it would be (Nozomi) Okuhura or the Indonesian, so lets see who I play,” Sindhu said after the match.
“She is not an easy player. She gave away easy points initially and after winning the first game, it was not easy as there were long rallies. She has got good strokes,” Sindhu added.
Coming into the contest, Sindhu had a 2-1 head-to-head record against Jindapol, who is enjoying a career-best rank of 11.
The Indian kept the shuttle in play, pushing Jindapol to the corners and returning the shuttles with immaculate ease early on.
In the first game, the duo split the initial six points before Sindhu jumped to a 7-3 lead after winning a long rally. Sindhu played a brilliant backhand return to move to 8-3 and eventually entered the interval with another precise stroke at the back of the court.
After the breather, Sindhu moved to a 15-7 lead and kept piling on the misery on the Thai who kept hitting the net and wide to bleed points.(PTI)
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