India’s badminton star PV Sindhu did a courageous effort to win a gold medal for India but ended up with silver medal in the women’s singles badminton championship while her Spain counterpart Carolina Marin won the match and gold medal at the Rio Olympics on Friday.
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The 21-year-old from Hyderabad, considered an aggressive player, crumbled under the relentless pressure created by world no-1 Carolina Marin of Spain to lose 21-19, 12-21, 15-21 in a pulsating final that lasted for an hour and 23 minutes.
The two-time World championship bronze medallist also became the fifth woman player from India to win a medal in Olympics history and the first to clinch a silver. “Thank you also to all of Huelva and my family”, she added.
India who sent their largest-ever contingent to Brazil and were facing the possibility of going home without a medal have seen their women athletes save face for the country. I think she has developed a lot in this tournament.
Marin claimed it was part of her strategy to keep the shuttles new and quick, while Sindhu wanted to stick with older ones.
It was a gap that Sindhu could not bridge as the Spaniard went to 20 15 before finishing off her Indian counterpart in an engrossing encounter. Indian ace once again took charge against the top ranked opponent, she didn’t showed any sign of nerves and cruised to the finals with 21-19, 21-10 win.
Though P.V. Sindhu lost the badminton finals at the Rio Olympics, her parents feel that she put up a strong fight and still made India proud with the silver medal. At 21, Sindhu’s journey has just begun and Gopi expects bigger things from one of her favourite students.
“This being Sindhu’s first Olympic game, we are happy with the performance she exhibited”.
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“Well played India’s youngest individual Olympics medal victor. I have the best team behind me, they helped me a lot and were awesome”, Marin said after the match. The Spanish player had an advantage with her track record of first place wins.
