Badminton
Swiss Open: PV Sindhu, HS Prannoy, and Kidambi Srikanth knocked out
Defending PV Sindhu was knocked out of the Swiss Open as Indian shuttlers endured a tough day with HS Prannoy and Kidambi Srikanth losing.
Defending Champion PV Sindhu was knocked out of the Swiss Open Super 300 badminton tournament on Thursday as Indian shuttlers drew a blank with HS Prannoy, Kidambi Srikanth, and Mithun Manjunath crashing out of the event.
Satwik Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty were the only shining light on a gloomy day as the second-seeded pair made a fantastic comeback against the Chinese Taipei pair of Fang-Chih Lee and Fang-Jen Lee.
After going down in the first game, Satwik/Chirag pulled off a marathon comeback to win the match 12-21, 21-17, 28-26 which went on for 81 minutes.
PV Sindhu was stunned by the 20-year-old Putri as she defeated her 21-15 in the first game. Sindhu made a fine comeback in the second game to win it 21-12.
But the youngster from Indonesia was brilliant with her winners in the deciding game and registered a famous win by 21-15, 12-21, 21-18.
Earlier, World No. 9 and fifth seed HS Prannoy's terrible performance saw him exit the tournament in the second round after losing in straight games against unseeded Christo Popov of France.
Former world number one Kidambi Srikanth's lean patch also continued as he was the first one to be knocked out after putting up a brave fight against Hong Kong's Cheuk Yiu Lee.
Prannoy, favorite coming into the contest, looked a pale shadow of himself in front of world No. 40 Popov as he failed to give any fight, losing 8-21, 8-21 to bow out of the men's singles event.
Going by rankings, there was hardly anything to separate the two as Srikanth is placed 20th in the world against his rival's 19th position.
It was a hard-fought match, but Lee kept his composure to emerge 22-20, 21-17 winner in the singles pre-quarterfinal contest.
National champion Mithun Manjunath also bowed out in the second round, losing 19-21, 10-21 to Chia Hao Lee of Chinese Taipei.
On Wednesday night, Prannoy defeated All England Championships finalist Shi Yu Qi of China to storm into the men's singles pre-quarterfinals.
(With PTI Inputs)