Huelva (Spain), December 17

In a historic first, India got assured of two medals in the men’s singles competition at the BWF World Badminton Championships after the seasoned Kidambi Srikanth and young Lakshya Sen entered their maiden semifinals of the marquee event here today. India are assured of at least a silver as Srikanth and Sen will face each other in the first semifinal tomorrow.

The third Indian in the men’s quarterfinals, HS Prannoy, was beaten 21-14 21-12 by Singapore’s Loh Kean Yew. Also, defending champion PV Sindhu’s campaign ended after she lost to familiar foe Tai Tzu Ying in the women’s singles quarterfinals.

On a day to remember, it was the 12th-seeded Srikanth who set the ball rolling by sending the Netherlands’ Mark Caljouw packing in a 21-8 21-7 win in just 26 minutes. And then the unseeded Sen fought his heart out to get the better of China’s Jun Peng Zhao 21-15 15-21 22-20 in an enthralling encounter lasting an hour and seven minutes.

The two thus joined the legendary Prakash Padukone (bronze in 1983) and B Sai Praneeth (bronze in 2019) as Indian medal winners in men’s singles in the showpiece event.

Sindhu, who lost 17-21 13-21 to Tai Tzu, has won five World Championships medals while Saina Nehwal has two to her name. The women’s doubles pair of Jwala Gutta and Ashwini Ponnappa had won a bronze in 2011.

Srikanth’s blur

The world No. 14 Srikanth was ahead 11-5 at the change of ends in the first game and then, from 14-8, he took seven straight points to pocket it in a jiffy. The second game was no different as he completely outplayed his opponent. From 4-3, Srikanth again won seven straight points. Then at 17-7, he pocketed four on the trot to win the match.

Sen, who saved a match point to reach the semis, said he was looking forward to playing Srikanth: “I haven’t played Srikanth in three years I think... Last was 2018, it’s been a while, so it will be a good match. He’s playing really well, he’s beaten opponents in single digits this week. I’m also playing well, and we both play an attacking style. Let’s see who makes the final.”

The Tai Tzu jinx

The top-seeded Tai Tzu has been quite a roadblock for Sindhu. The straight-game defeat showed just why. Sindhu struggled to match Tai Tzu’s speed, court coverage and drop shots, as has been the case many times in their previous meetings, though the Indian produced some fine cross-court smashes today.

Sindhu, who also made numerous unforced errors, was always playing a catch-up game. The win extended the head-to-head record between the two top players to 15-5 in favour of the Chinese Taipei player.

World No. 7 Sindhu had also lost to Tai Tzu in the Tokyo Games semifinals earlier this year. “I think I should have been more patient. With Tai Tzu, as I mentioned, there are not going to be any easy points and you could see today, there were no easy points,” Sindhu said later.

For world No. 1 Tai Tzu, the revenge of her 2019 Worlds defeat to Sindhu at the same stage couldn’t have been sweeter. — PTI