Singapore. Former champion PV Sindhu entered the second round of the women’s singles of the Singapore Open Super 750 badminton tournament here on Wednesday but Lakshya Sen was eliminated after losing to world number one Viktor Axelsen. Sindhu won the BWF title in Singapore two years ago and was the runner-up in the Thailand Open last week.
Sindhu defeated world number 21 player Line Hojmark Jägersfeldt of Denmark 21-12 22-20 in a 44-minute opening round match. Now in the second round, she will face Rio Olympic champion Carolina Marin of Spain. World number three player Marin has a winning record of 11-5 against Sindhu. The last match between the two in Denmark Open was full of arguments in which both the players were shown yellow cards for arguing.
On the other hand, world number 14 Lakshya, who made his Olympic debut in Paris, presented a tough challenge to Ecclesen. But he lost 13-21 21-16 13-21 in 62 minutes. Ecclesen won his first title of the season at the Thailand Open last week. Kidambi Srikanth had to retire after trailing 14-21 3-11 against fifth seed Kodai Naraoka of Japan in the first round match.
B Sumeeth Reddy and N Sikki Reddy lost to Malaysia’s Goh Soon Huat and Lai Shevon Jamie 18-21 19-21 in the mixed doubles match. In another match, the mixed pair of Venkat Gaurav Prasad and Juhi Dewangan lost to Mads Vestergaard and Christine Bush 8-21 8-21.
Sindhu had a 3-0 win record against Denmark’s Line but at one point both were tied at 8-8 and the Indian player managed to take a two-point lead before the break. In a short while Sindhu was ahead 16-11. After this Line made a lot of ‘unforced’ mistakes and the Indian player won the game by maintaining eight game points.
Sindhu continued the same rhythm in the second game and took the lead from 5-1 to 11-7 at the break. The Danish player made a comeback and made the score 14-14 and was just four points away from taking the match to the deciding game. But Sindhu made a timely comeback and dashed Linne’s hopes and won the match by scoring six points. Lakshya looked a bit tired in his match and was trailing 1-4 against Axelsen. By the break, Axelsen took a lead of 11-3. Soon Axelsen won 10 game points.
However, in the second game, Lakshya played better and with aggressive returns, he equalised the score from 6-9 to 9-9. After the break, Lakshya took a lead of 14-12. The Indian player smashed and made the score 18-14. Axelsen looked a bit desperate and lost the game due to a wrong decision. Lakshya was ahead 6-3 at the start of the deciding game but Axelsen took control and equalised the score at 7-7 and maintained a one-point lead till the break. Then he scored eight out of the next nine points to make the score 19-11. Then he won with a smash.