SUZHOU, May 14: Double Olympic medallist PV Sindhu’s gallant fight ended in agony as India made a dismal start to their Sudirman Cup campaign, going down to the formidable Chinese Taipei 1-4 in their group C opening round tie here on Sunday.
There was, however, no lack of fight from the Indian players as Tanisha Crasto and K Sai Prateek started on a positive note in the mixed doubles contest but they ran out of steam in the end, losing 21-18 24-26 6-21 to world no. 30 Yang Po-Hsuan and Hu Ling Fang.
World Number 9 HS Prannoy then couldn’t find his ‘A’ game, going down 19-21 15-21 to world no. 5 Chou Tien Chen as India lagged 0-2 after the first two matches.
Sindhu was then handed the responsibility to bring India back into the tie but it was always going to be a tough task with her nemesis and former world no. 1 Tai Tzu Ying standing across the net.
The 27-year-old from Hyderabad, who hasn’t been in the best of form lately, produced a gritty performance after the opening game reversal but couldn’t go the distance with Tai Tzu managing a 21-14 18-21 21-17 win in an hour and four minutes.
It allowed Chinese Taipei take an unassailable 3-0 lead in the five-match tie.
Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty then fought hard before losing 13-21 21-17 18-21 to Lee Yang and Ye Hong Wei in the men’s doubles match in a little over an hour as India further slumped to 0-4.
World No 17 Treesa Jolly and P Gayatri Gopichand then showed tremendous grit as they recovered from an opening game loss to eke out a 21-15 18-21 13-21 win over Lee Chia Hsin and Teng Chun Hsun in the final women’s doubles tie to help India avoid a cleansweep.
India will face Commonwealth Games mixed team champion Malaysia in their second Group C match on Monday.
Malaysia beat Australia 5-0 to top the group on Sunday. (PTI)
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