Sindhu, who had finished runner-up at the last edition in Dubai, dished out a superb game, mixing with patience with aggression, to edging the Japanese 24-22, 21-15.
After dishing out a last-ball thriller in the last league match, Mumbai Indians and Kolkata Knight Riders would square off against each other yet again in Mumbai on Wednesday but the stakes are high now as it will be end of the road for the loser in the Indian Premier League.
The fifth seeded Indian will face Indonesian Fitriani Fitriani next.
Dishing out another superlative all-round performance, Mumbai Indians crushed Delhi Daredevils by 32 runs to virtually qualify for the play-offs of the Indian Premier League in Mumbai on Saturday.
Latha Nair, partner at K&S Partners, examines what constitutes a GI tag and what the gaps in the Indian GI law are.
Meel Patthar is, both by theme and design, a tragedy of inertia, observes Rohit Satish Nair.
Grandmaster Abhijeet Gupta won a silver by pocketing seven points out of nine games while Tania Sachdev turned out to be the best woman performer for India with a bronze medal in the Chess Olympiad, that concluded in Istanbul Turkey on Sunday.
Ace Indian shuttler Saina Nehwal advanced to the quarter-finals of the Indonesia Super Series Premier tournament with a comfortable straight-game win over local favourite Fitriani Fitriani in the women's singles event in Jakarta on Thursday.
Chennai Super Kings dished out a disciplined all-round display to notch up a comfortable 10-run victory over Deccan Chargers in their Indian Premier League match in Chennai.
Masterchef George Calombaris shares food secrets, his love for Indian cuisine and more..
How often have you wondered what sets a chef's food apart from your home-cooked meals? Read on...
Events that shaped the nation in the past 48 hours in images.
Indian shuttlers Saina Nehwal, Kidambi Srikanth and Sameer Verma also advanced to the second round of the $550,000 tournament at the Barclaycard Arena.
What a remarkable comeback by Ashish Nehra. After being almost forgotten, the left-arm pacer now leads India's Most Valuable Player (MVP) rankings in One-Day Internationals this season.
Ajay Jayaram emerged as the lone survivor at the Korea Open after nothing up a convincing straight-game win over China's Huang Yuxiang to advance to the quarter-finals of men's singles of the Super Series event, in Seoul, on Thursday.
A summary of sports events and persons who made news on Friday.
'I don't trust these days. Like now, everyone likes Mimi and my phone is constantly ringing. But tomorrow if I make a flop, the opposite will happen.'
'The travesty of recent Indian strategic thought is it emerges not from our brains, but from whatever part of the anatomy that secretes the prickliest hormones,' says Shekhar Gupta.
India's campaign at the Sudirman Cup ended after they went down 0-3 against top seed and 10-time champions China in the quarter-finals of the mixed team championship in Gold Coast.
Olympic silver medallist P V Sindhu continued her unbeaten run while debutant Sameer Verma also qualified for the knockout stage with a straight-game win in his last Group B match at the BWF World Tour Finals.
Services would be introduced on eight Delhi-bound Shatabdi trains and then in Rajdhanis and Durontos.
Investment announcement for $100 bn over 5 years likely.
Images from Thursday's IPL match between Sunrisers Hyderabad and Delhi Capitals in New Delhi.
