Sindhu loses to Japanese counterpart at important semi-finals

It was a heartbreaking semi-final match that the sports fans had to see at the All England Open Championships that was held on 17th March 2018

Olympic silver medallist P.V. Sindhu let history slip out of her hands as she lost an epic semifinal against world no 2 Japanese Akane Yamaguchi to bow out of the USD 1000,000 All England championship at Birmingham.

Yamaguchi held her nerves to register a hard-fought three-game victory 19-21, 21-19, 21-18 over Sindhu in a gripping semi-final which lasted for an hour and 19 minutes. With this win, Yamaguchi improved her head-to-head record 4-6 against Sindhu.

This was the ninth victory on the trot for the 20-year-old Japanese, who had won the German Open early this month.

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Yamaguchi will now meet World No. 1 and defending champion Tai Tzu Ying of Chinese Taipei in Sunday’s final. Tai Tzu defeated China’s Chen Yufei 21-15, 20-22, 21-13 in the other semi-final.

Playing her maiden All England Open semi-final, Sindhu continued from where she had left as she opened the first game with a body smash to earn her first point and soon race to a 6-0 lead. Yamaguchi fought back to win few points but the lanky Indian went into the break at 11-5 with a six-point advantage.

Sindhu kept her dominance post the mid-break game and extended her lead to 17-10 with a deceptive shot before Yamaguchi bounced back to win seven points on the trot and make it 17-17. Sindhu, however, kept her calm to seal the first game 21-19 in 20 minutes.

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The second game saw Sindhu trailing 3-4, after the initial exchanges, as her drop shot found the net followed by 26 shots rally. Both of them were soon locked at 9-9 but the World No. 2 Yamaguchi surged ahead 11-9 at the mid-game break.

World No. 3 Sindhu made it 12-all and that was followed by a riveting 44-shot rally. However, Yamaguchi maintained her momentum as she came up with a fine cross-court smash to take 17-14 lead. The Japanese then forced the match into the decider by winning the game 21-19.

Both the players pushed each other to the limit as the third and deciding game started off with another long rally. Sindhu raced to 7-3 lead and headed into the break with a four-point advantage leading 11-7.

She extended her lead to 13-7 before Yamaguchi won four straight points to reduce the deficit. Yamaguchi drew level at 14-14 and then it became an even contest which the Japanese eventually went on to win 21-18 and made it to the summit clash.