India’s shuttler PV Sindhu will face reigning All England champion Nozomi Okuhara of Japan for a place in the final of the women’s singles event at the Rio Olympics here today.
The double World Championship bronze medallist Sindhu has been in very good form, dismissing two higher-ranked opponents Chinese Taipei’s Tai Tzu Ying and World No. 2 Wang Yihan of China in the pre-quarter-final and the quarter-final respectively.
On Tuesday, the World No.10 Sindhu stunned London Olympic sliver medallist Yihan in straight games. Faced with a much higher rated opponent, the 21-year-old from Hyderabad scripted a 22-20, 21-19 victory in 54 minutes over the former World No.1.
The Indian won the majority of the long rallies and used her power-packed smashes and cross-court shots to good effect. At Rio, Sindhu has joined Saina Nehwal, who was the first Indian women’s singles player to reach the semi-finals of the Olympics at the London Games in 2012. Saina won a bronze medal at the London Games.
Now, Sindhu faces a tricky opponent in Okuhara, who has been living a dream in a fast-rising career. The Japanese won her first BWF Superseries title at the 2015 home Open. In 2016, the 21-year-old won the prestigious All England Open, becoming the first Japanese woman player to achieve this feat in the last 39 years.
On the other hand, the 21-year-old Indian became the first ever Indian women’s singles player to win two bronze medals at the World Championships.
She won the 2013 World Championship bronze by defeating Bae Yeon of Korea and Minatsu Mitani of Japan in 2014.
It will be the fifth meeting between them with the Japanese dominating thrice and having the upper hand at the last meeting at Badminton Asia Team Championships 2016 at Hyderabad.
Sindhu had just edged over Okuhara in Badminton Asia Youth Under 19 Championships 2012 in the third and deciding game. Meanwhile, Kidambi Srikanth is happy with his performance after losing in the quarter-finals to two-time defending champion Lin Dan of China.
Srikanth, playing in his maiden Olympic Games, went down fighting to Dan 6-21, 21-11 and 18-21 in a match lasting near about an hour.
“I was never unhappy with the way I was playing. I was always playing well. It’s just that I couldn’t win or finish the matches well, although at times I was actually dominating,” he said.
On being asked about his tactics against the Super Dan he replied: “You can’t really plan anything against these kinds of players. And you can’t always repeat a game.”
“There wasn’t a special strategy. We just wanted to be aggressive and not commit simple mistakes. Overall there wasn’t any special strategy, but to just stay in the rally,” added the 23-year-old.

Vinesh injured, Sakshi in repechage
India’s women wrestlers Sakshi Malik and Vinesh Phogat lost their respective quarter-final bouts in contrasting fashion to dent India’s medal chances. While Sakshi lost 2-9 to Russia’s Valeria Koblova in 58kg Freestyle category, it was heartbreak for Vinesh, who was forced to concede her 48kg bout against China’s Yanan Sun 1-2 after a freak knee injury. Sakshi was still in contention for bronze via Repechage as Valeria made it to the final. The medal matches were scheduled for late last night.
Earlier, Sakshi defeated Moldova’s Mariana Esanu Cherdivara on a four point take down criteria to enter the 1/4 final round.
Meanwhile, Despite clocking her season’s best timing, double lap runner Tintu Luka finished sixth in the 800 metre heats. Tintu started off well but her strategy backfired to finish with a timing of 2:00.58 minutes in Heat 3. Tintu finished overall 29th in the qualification round.
The qualification round was topped by Canada’s Melissa Bishop followed by Marina Arzamasova of Belarus and Habitam Alemu of Ethiopia respectively at second and third spots.