India's badminton ace P V Sindhu believes she would be in top form at the BWF's World Tour Final as a recent break gave her the time to be well-prepared for the season-ending tournament, starting on December 12.
Newly-crowned world No. 1 Saina Nehwal edged out China's Sun Yu to reach the women's singles semi-finals of the $8500,000 Malaysia Open Super Series Premier badminton tournament in Kuala Lumpur.
Erratic Saina stunned by Chinese youngster
Summary of sports events and persons who made news on Wednesday.
Summary of sports events and persons who made news on Tuesday
Kidambi Srikanth and H S Prannoy sailed into the pre-quarter-finals, but it was heartbreak for Parupalli Kashyap in the men's singles at the World Badminton Championships in Jakarta on Wednesday.
A summary of sports events and sports persons, who made news on Wednesday
Seven Indian shuttlers, including Saina Nehwal and Jwala Gutta, officially earned qualification berths for the August Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro after the much-awaited BWF world rankings were released on Thursday. Friday's rankings were used to determine the Olympic qualifiers in each of the five categories -- men's singles, women's singles, men's doubles, women's doubles and mixed doubles -- from the points accumulated in the period between May 4, 2015 and May 1st, 2016. Four years ago, five Indians had qualified at London Olympics. This year, London Olympics bronze medallist Saina would be representing India in her third Games, while the women's doubles pair of Jwala and Ashwini Ponnappa will also play their second Olympics in August. Besides, K Srikanth and P V Sindhu earned their maiden Olympic berths in men's singles and women's events respectively. For the first time, India will have two women's singles players playing in the Olympics.
Saina Nehwal's semi-final jinx continued as she suffered another defeat against her nemesis Tai Tzu Ying of Chinese Taipei in the women's singles at the Malaysia Super Series Premier, in Shah Alam, on Saturday.
Olympic silver medallist P V Sindhu made a winning start to her maiden campaign at the prestigious BWF World Super Series Final, defeating higher-ranked Akane Yamaguchi of Japan in an entertaining opening women's singles Group B match in Dubai on Thursday. Sindhu, who recently clinched the China Super Series Premier and reached the finals at Hong Kong Open, eked out a 12-21 21-8 21-15 win over World No. 8 Yamaguchi in an exciting clash which lasted little over an hour. In the opening game, Sindhu conceded a 3-6 lead early on as she faltered with her strokes even as Yamaguchi grabbed points with her deception and riding on her rival's mistakes to go 11-5 up at the break.
Olympic silver medallist P V Sindhu avenged her heart-breaking loss at the Rio Games to two-time World Champion Carolina Marin with a thrilling straight-game victory in a do-or-die, women's singles Group B contest and sealed her place at the semi-finals of the BWF World Super Series Finals in Dubai on Friday.
In the women's singles match, Sindhu brought some smiles back in the Indian camp after seeing off Thailand's Pornpawee Chochuwong 21-15, 19-21, 21-13, setting up a clash with Japan's Aya Ohori on the eve of her 23rd birthday on Thursday.
A summary of sports events and persons who made news on Thursday
Young Kidambi Srikanth continued his meteoric rise in world badminton as he ended the season by becoming only the third Indian male shuttler to break into the top-five, reaching a career-high fourth after hovering in the 40s in the beginning of the year.
A summary of sports events and sports persons, who made news on Tuesday
A summary of sports events and sports persons, who made news on Friday
India began their campaign Badminton Asia Team Championships in style with both men's and women's teams posting victories against their Singapore rivals to make it to the quarterfinals. Indian men made a clean sweep of their five-match tie against Singapore, who had lost to China two days ago. India, China and Singapore are part of Group A. Despite the absence of star player Saina Nehwal, the Indian women registered a comprehensive 5-0 win against Singapore and also entered the quarter finals as the Singapore team lost to Japan earlier. Each tie comprises three singles and two doubles matches. India's rising shuttler Srikanth scored a comfortable 21-16, 12-21, 21-13 win over his Singapore rival Zi Liang Derek Wong in the first Singles match. The Singaporean tried to make matters difficult for Srikanth, but the world number nine bounced back to have the last laugh.
A summary of sports events and persons who made news on Wednesday.
A summary of sports events and persons who made news on Thursday.
Badminton ace Saina Nehwal topped her group to march into the women's singles semi-finals while Kidambi Srikanth reached the last four stage despite losing his last men's singles round robin match at the BWF World Super Series Finals in Dubai on Friday.
Rio Olympic Silver medallist P V Sindhu's brilliant run at the BWF World Super Series Final came to an end after she suffered a narrow defeat against World No 5 Korean Sung Ji-Hyun in the women's singles semi-finals, in Dubai on Saturday.
The London Olympics bronze medallist will next play seventh seed Nozomi Okuhara of Japan, who knocked out two-time defending champion Spain's Carolina Marin 21-18, 14-21, 21-15 in the other quarter-final.
She clinched three individual titles and a couple of bronze medals at prestigious team events this season but far from satiated, ace Indian shuttler Saina Nehwal feels she could have garnered more trophies had it not been for some missed opportunities.
India shuttler Kidambi Srikanth believes the days of domination of Lin Dan or Lee Chong Wei are over and the tournaments are more wide open than ever.
Summary of sports events and persons who made news on Tuesday
P V Sindhu opens her campaign in the China Open women's singles against Evgeniya Kosetskaya of Russia, in Fuzhou, China, on Tuesday.
A summary of sports events and persons who made news on Wednesday
Summary of sports events and persons who made news on Wednesday.
Take a look at what fit-again Saina needs to do before going into the Olympic Games in August this year.
'Experience is important. But if you work hard, you can improve faster. There is a three-month gap now and we will look to train harder and improve our fitness for Olympics' 'I think we need to cut down simple errors on court and not give away easy points. We have got to work hard each day without thinking about the results, as giving our best is in our hands'
Olympic bronze-medallist Saina Nehwal said the triumph at the China Open Super Series Premier was one of her "toughest" and it showed that the hard work was paying off.
A summary of sports events and persons who made news on Thursday
World Badminton Championships silver medallist Saina Nehwal feels her decision to shift base to Bangalore and train under Vimal Kumar turned out to be a masterstroke.
The dream run of top shuttlers Saina Nehwal and Kidambi Srikanth came to an end in World Super Series Finals badminton tournament.
Marin retained the world title with a 21-16, 21-19 win over the Indian ace.
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