Jakarta: After winning their respective second-round matches here on Thursday, former world champion PV Sindhu and Paris Olympic semi-finalist Lakshya Sen advanced to the Indonesia Masters quarterfinals.
In her pre-quarterfinal match, Sindhu defeated Line Kjaerfeldt of Denmark 21-19, 21-18 in 43 minutes, while Lakshya defeated Jason Gunawan of Hong Kong 21-10, 21-11 in a match lasting more than 30 minutes.
This was Sindhu's sixth win over Kjaerfeldt in seven meetings, with the only loss coming in last year's Sudirman Cup.
Sindhu will next face tournament top seed and world No. 4 Chen Yu Fei of China. The duo have met 13 times so far, with the Chinese holding a slight edge at 7-6 in the overall record, IANS reported.
On Wednesday, two-time Olympic medallist Sindhu, India’s highest-ranked women’s singles player at 13th, beat Japan’s world No. 35 Manami Suizu 22-20, 21-18 in 53 minutes to reach the pre-quarterfinals.
On the other hand, Lakshya, who registered a 21-13, 16-21, 21-14 win over world No. 23 Wang Tzu Wei of Chinese Taipei in his opening-round match on Wednesday, will next face Panitchaphon Teeraratsakul of Thailand, who upset 2024 Paris Olympics Lee Zii Jia 15-21, 21-17, 21-8 in the quarter-finals on Friday.
Former world No. 1 Kidambi Srikanth, who reached the round of 16 with a 21-15, 21-23, 24-22 victory over Japan's Koki Watanabe, will be in action later in the day against Chou Tien Chen of Taipei. Anmol Kharb, meanwhile, takes on Nozomi Okuhara of Japan in the women's singles second round.
World Championships bronze medallist HS Prannoy and rising star Tanvi Sharma crashed out of the BWF Super tournament after losing their first-round matches on Wednesday.
Kiran George also lost his men's singles opener in straight games to Indonesia’s Moh. Zaki Ubaidillah, 21-17, 21-14. India’s mixed doubles pairs Dhruv Kapila/Tanisha Crasto and Rohan Kapoor/Ruthvika Shivani Gadde also lost their opening-round matches.