Japan Open | Kidambi Srikanth lone survivor as Indian challenge falters
India’s fight at the Japan Open took a big hit today as every player, barring Kidambi Srikanth, failed to make it past the second round of the Tour 750 event. While Srikanth defeated Wing Ki Vincent of Hong Kong, PV Sindhu suffered a surprising straight games loss to China’s Fangjie Gao.
Kidambi Srikanth was the lone ranger for India at the ongoing Japan Open today as he made his way to a comfortable 21-15, 21-14 victory over Wing Ki Vincent of Hong Kong. Srikanth eased his way to victory over his Asian counterpart in a match that lasted for 36 minutes. Wong got off to a good start in the first game as he maintained a safe two-point lead over his opponent. But Srikanth buckled up and bagged seven points in a row to go up 10-5 midway through the first game. Wong fought back and reduced the deficit to two points at 15-13. But Srikanth gave away just two more points before winning the first game by a score of 21-15. Seventh-seeded Srikanth raced off to a 2-0 lead in the second game as well. His performance against Wong was in stark contrast to his disappointing outing at the recently concluded Asian Games. Srikanth kept a five-point lead at 10-5, which he converted into a nine-point lead at 18-9. The Indian ace kept his calm to win the game 21-14 and secure a spot in the quarterfinals.
However, that was as good as it got for the Indian contingent in Japan. HS Prannoy bowed out of the tournament against Anthony Ginting of Indonesia in the second round. World number 10, Ginting was quick off the blocks as he raced away to a 4-0 lead. Even though Prannoy levelled the game up at 5-5, 7-7 and 10-10, it looked like the Indonesian was always in control. That idea was proved to be correct in the second game as Ginting came up with two streaks of five points and four points to seal the first game 21-14.
The second game proved to be a much closer contest as both players refused to let the man on the other side have a lead bigger than three points. Eventually, it was the Indonesian who went into the break with a one-point lead but the game but no stretch looked like a done and dusted one. It was still close to 15-15 but Ginting upped the ante and thanks with some errors from Prannoy, the World No. 10 took the second game 21-17 to book a place in the quarters.
In women's singles match, Sindhu was stunned by China's Fangjie. After sharing the first couple of points, it was the teenager who raced away to an 8-2 lead. Sindhu fought back with intent but found herself trailing 8-11 at the break. If Gao had dominated the first part of the game, it for the Indian who raced ahead by first levelling things up at 13-13, before taking a 17-14 lead. However, the youngster was in no mood to be denied and restored parity at 18-18 before taking the next three points and the game.
Realizing the urgency, Sindhu started the second game off with some positive shots taking a 5-0 lead. But as had been the trend of the match, Gao took seven of the next nine points on offer to draw level at 7-7. It was pretty much one-way traffic after that as she took a further four points to lead going into the interval. Even though Sindhu, who trailed by as many as five points in the second part of the game, tried to launch a fightback in the dying stages of the game, it was not enough as the Chinese star sealed the game 21-19.
India did not have a good day in the doubles section as well with both the Men’s and Mixed Doubles’ teams bowed out in the Round of 16. While the Men’s Doubles pairing of Manu Attri and Sumeeth Reddy were ousted by Jiting He and Qiang Tan, the Mixed duo of Pranav Chopra and Sikki Reddy suffered the same fate at the hands of Malaysia’s Peng Chan and Liu Goh.
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