New Delhi (India): In what may come as a huge blow to the Indian fans, ace shuttler Saina Nehwal crashed out of the India Open BWF World Tour 500 after going down in straight games to Beiwen Zhang of USA in the quarter-finals here on Friday.
The fourth-seed failed to continue her good form in the tournament so far and slumped to a 10-21, 13-21 defeat at the hands of Zhang in a last-eight encounter that lasted more than half-an-hour.
Last week, London Olympics bronze-medallist Nehwal made it to the finals of the Indonesia Masters before eventually losing the title to world number one Tai Tzu Ying.
Ying defeated Nehwal 21-9, 21-13 in just 27 minutes to become the first player from her country to win the Indonesia Masters title.
Earlier in the day, Rio Olympic silver-medallist PV Sindhu continued her rich vein of form as she bounced back from a game down against Spain’s Beatriz Corrales to book her place in the semi-finals of the tournament.
After comfortably winning the opening game, the top-seed went down in the second before she rebounded strongly to post a 21-12, 19-21, 21-11 win over eighth-seed Beatriz Corrales in a thrilling quarter-final clash of the women’s singles event.
Sindhu will now lock horns with third-seed Ratchanok Intanon of Thailand for a place in the summit showdown of the tournament.
Meanwhile, Indian shuttlers B. Sai Praneeth and Parupalli Kashyap suffered a major blow as they bowed out of the tournament after going down in straight games in their respective quarter-final clashes.
Third-seed Chou Tien Chen of Chinese Taipei proved to be too good for the Praneeth, who clearly wasn’t at his best, as he knocked down the Indian 21-15, 21-13 in a last-eight clash that lasted 43 minutes.
Kashyap, on the other hand, also crashed out of the tournament after slumping to a 16-21, 18-21 defeat at the hands of China’s Qiao Bin.(ANI)