Indonesia Open: PV Sindhu, Srikanth and Praneeth off to a good start, enter second round

India's double Olympic medallist P V Sindhu showed great determination to outwit her opponent in the women's singles opening round, while B Sai Praneeth and Kidmabi Srikanth also advanced to the men's singles second round of the Indonesia Open Super 1000 event on Wednesday (November 24).

After a slow start, Sindhu, the reigning world champion, engineered a turnaround to register a hard-fought 17-21 21-17 21-17 win over a tenacious Aya Ohori of Japan in one hour 10 minutes.

With the win, Sindhu improved her impressive record against the Japanese shuttler to 11-0.

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Srikanth gets the better of compatriot Prannoy 21-15, 19-21, 21-12 in R1 of #IndonesiaOpen2021 (BWF World Tour Super 1000).
Last week also Srikanth had defeated Prannoy in Indonesia Masters. This is Srikanth's 6th win over him in last 7 matches. #IndonesiaMasters2021 pic.twitter.com/ykbdTAZdPg — India_AllSports (@India_AllSports) November 24, 2021

World number seven Sindhu, who made a semifinal exit after suffering a straight-game defeat to Japan's Akane Yamaguchi here last week, will meet 23-year-old German shuttler Yvonne Li in the second round. It will be the first meeting between the third seed Indian and world number 26 Li.

In the men's singles, world no. 16 B Sai Praneeth clinched a 21-19 21-18 win over France's Toma Junior Popov. In a repeat of last week's Indonesia Masters quarterfinal, Srikanth once again got the better of compatriot HS Prannoy.

The former world number one Srikanth, who is coming off two back-to-back semifinal finishes at Hylo Open and Indonesia Masters, continued his good run of form as he eked out a 21-15 19-21 21-12 victory over Prannoy in 56 minutes. While Praneeth will next take on Christo Popov of France in the second round, Srikanth will meet the winner of the first-round clash between Tokyo Olympics gold medallist second seed Dane Victor Axelsen and Japan's Koki Watanbe.

The mixed doubles pairing of N Sikki Reddy and Dhruv Kapila, however, made a first-round exit, falling to the Japanese duo of Kyohei Yamashita and Naru Shinoya, 7-21 12-21. It was a bad day in the office for Reddy who made a first-round exit in the women's doubles event as well.

Reddy and veteran shuttler Ashwini Ponnappa went down 27-29 18-21 to the fifth-seeded Bulgarian duo of Gabriela Stoeva and Stefani Stoeva.

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