PV Sindhu upsets No.1 seed Sung Ji Hyun to enter Malaysia Masters final
Indian shuttler PV Sindhu registered an upset victory over top seed Sung Ji Hyun from South Korea, in a hard-fought contest in the semi-final on Saturday, to enter the final of the $120,000 Malaysia Masters Grand Prix Gold at Penang, Malaysia. However, second seed Kidambi Srikanth crashed out in the semi-final after losing to unseeded Iskandar Zulkarnain Zainuddin in straight games.
The third-seeded Indian, who had registered a comfortable victory against Lindaweni Fanetri in the quarters, looked in prime form in the semi-final going up against the top-seed. Heading into the match, Sindhu had a 3-2 head-to-head record against the South Korean, who ended up on the right side of the result in the last two meetings.
Sindhu started the match on the front foot earning point after point with Sung Ji Hyun’s smashes going well wide off the court. The top-seed slowly found his rhythm in the match, and changed her tactic of going for first-time smashes, by playing long rallies and slowly moved ahead of her rival in the scoreboard. As the break arrived, Sung Ji Hyun, ranked No. 8 in the World, looked the superior player on the court with her delicate net play and movement.
However, Sindhu won eight consecutive points after the interval to race to a 17-11 lead with the top seed looking completely lost. A series of unforced errors from the Korean, and good attacking play from
With the drift playing a major part in deciding the winner, as the players exchanged sides, the result also changed. All of sudden, smashes from the top-seed found the inside of the court and Sindhu became the one, which was sending smashes wide. The Indian was unable to keep her rhythm throughout the second game and lost the serve every time after winning a point. With drift and momentum on her side, the top-seeded Korean raced to the game point and won the game 21-12 to level things up.
Once again, sides changed and so did the fortunes. The final game started as a close contest with both players exchanging leads in the initial minutes. However, Sindhu rampaged her way into a six-point lead before the break to stamp her authority in the contest. Trailing 5-13 in the final game, Sung Ji-Hyun produced a hairpin drop near the net and hoped for an easy point, but her hopes went up in flames, after Sindhu produced a full-length dive to save it, and lifted it away from the top-seed to add to her lead. With every attempt of a comeback going against her, the World No.8 easily surrendered to Sindhu in the final game and the Indian took it 21-10 to avenge her defeat in the quarters of 2015 BWF World Championships.
Sindhu will now face the winner of the match between Kirsty Gilmour and seventh seed Yui Hashimoto in the final on Sunday.
However, in the Men’s Singles, World No.2 Kidambi Srikanth crashed out of the tournament after losing 25-27, 9-21 to unseeded Malaysian Iskandar Zulkarnain Zainuddin. In what was an epic first game, both players went neck-to-neck matching each other point for point and mistake for mistake. Both Srikanth and Iskandar missed three chances each to take the first game. The home favourite finally took the game 27-25 after taking his fourth game point to go into the lead. In the second game, second-seeded Srikanth looked nowhere in the game by committing unforced errors to gift the Malaysian a route to the final.
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