HS Prannoy assured of bronze medal after beating world no. 1 Axelsen in World Championships quarters
India's HS Prannoy managed to uproot World no.1 Viktor Axelsen in the quarter-finals of the BWF World Championships on Friday and assured himself of a maiden medal in the tournament. After losing the first game rather easily, Prannoy beat the reigning champion 13-21, 21-15, 21-16.
In the first game, Prannoy was no match to the Dane and was trailing throughout. At one point, the Indian was 9-3 down, and the gap kept increasing. But come the second game, Prannoy was at his best and used the court to his advantage.ย
When the scores were at 14-10 in the favour of Prannoy, he secured four straight points in the game to seal the deal and take the match into the third. In the third and deciding game, the Indian played even better and had a cushion of six points at 12-6.
Axelsen tried to make a comeback from there, but Prannoy had the hunger to win his first World Championship medal. He is now assured of a bronze medal and has thus become the fifth men's shuttler to win a medal at the prestigious championship after Prakash Padukone, Lakshya Sen, Kidambi Srikanth and B Sai Praneeth.ย
In the semis, he will be up against world no. 3 Kunlavut Vitidsarn of Thailand.
Prannoy secures a historic medal and HOW! ๐๐ฅ
โ BAI Media (@BAI_Media) August 25, 2023
Beats home-favourite, Tokyo Olympic ๐ฅ medalist Viktor Axelsen to secure ๐ฎ๐ณโs 1๏ธโฃ4๏ธโฃth medal at #BWFWorldChampionships ๐
Proud of you champ!
๐ธ: @badmintonphoto#Copenhagen2023#IndiaontheRise#BadmintonTwitter#Badminton pic.twitter.com/JK3dbz7aI9