India's Sindhu, Srikanth advance to quarterfinals at Australian Open

Sydney: P.V. Sindhu, a two-time Olympic medalist from India, and Kidambi Srikanth, a former World No. 1 player, both won their respective second-round matches in straight games to advance to the quarterfinals of the Australian Open badminton tournament.

In a 29-minute match, Sindhu, who earned a silver medal at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro and a bronze medal at the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, defeated fellow compatriot Aakarshi Kashyap.

Srikanth registered an equally comprehensive victory, beating Su Li Yang of Chinese Taipei 21-10, 21-17 in a second-round match in Court 3 at the Quaycentre in the BWF World Tour Super 500 event.

This was Sindhu's first clash with Aakarshi and the more experienced player held the upper hand throughout the match, pressing home her advantage for a comfortable win. Sindhu, seeded fifth in the event, will next face fourth seed Beiwen Zhang of Malaysia, who reached the last-eight stage with a hard-fought 19-21, 21-10, 21-12 win against Huang Yu-Hsun in a second-round clash.

Srikanth, who defeated Japan's Kenta Nishimoto 21-18, 21-7 in the first round, will meet the winner of the match between India's Priyanshu Rajawat and Wang Tzu Wei of Chinese Taipei.

With inputs from IANS