Sindhu, Sen enter US Open quarterfinals, Sankar too win
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Council Bluffs (US): The top Indian shuttlers P V Sindhu and Lakshya Sen advanced to the quarterfinals of the women's and men's singles quarterfinals of the US Open Super 300 badminton tournaments, respectively, with victories in a row of games.
Third-seeded Sindhu, who has won two Olympic medals, defeated Korea's Sung Shuo Yun 21-14, 21-12. After winning the Canada Open Super 500 the previous week, Sen defeated Jan Louda of the Czech Republic in 39 minutes, winning 21-8, 23-21.
Sindhu will face China's Gao Fang Jie next, while it will be an all-Indian clash in men's singles when third seed Sen takes on promising 19-year-old S Sankar Muthusamy from Chennai, PTI reported.
It has been an impressive run for the 2022 World Junior Championships silver medalist who registered a fighting 21-18 21-23 21-13 win over Israel's Misha Zilberman.
Sindhu didn't break much sweat against Sung, who couldn't pose any real challenge to the Indian during the match. Sindhu jumped to a 7-2 lead early on before extending it to 13-5.
Sung managed to narrow down the deficit to 11-14 but Sindhu dashed any hope of a comeback, keeping a grip on the rallies to eventually earn the bragging rights.
After the change of sides, Sung started to match up to the Indian initially as she had a slender 5-3 lead but it soon evaporated with Sindhu breaking off from 7-7 to march ahead.
At the interval, Sindhu had an 11-8 lead and she kept moving ahead as Sung crumbled. From 16-12, Sindhu reeled off the remaining points without much ado.
Sen too blazed his way to a 6-1 lead and then jumped to 17-5 in a jiffy to take it away from his opponent in the opening game. The 39-year-old Czech, however, made a remarkable comeback in the second game, making life tough for Sen.
Jan was 8-5 up and also held a 19-14 advantage, giving hope for a reversal but Sen scripted a sensational recovery with five points to claw back at 19-19. Sen then saved a game point to close out the match after some tight rallies.