Sindhu will meet Spanish top seed Carolina Marin, who hammered China’s reigning champion Li Xuerui 21-14 21-16 in the early semi-final.
Advertisement
Excited to make the final in her maiden Olympics, the lanky girl said: “I hope I would give my best. I hope I can give my best”. That’s in the next game.
The daughter of two volleyball players in southern India, Sindhu began playing badminton at the age of eight. Sindhu had a good lead in the second game but Wang Yihan recovered very well. “I know it will be a tough match but I want to win gold”.
Sindhu squeezed out the first game against Wang Yihan (pictured bottom) 22-20 but had only marginally more breathing room in the second game, which she won 21-19 to book her spot in the semi-finals. Although there were some nervous moments at the end, Sindhu held on until Okuhara made the error under pressure by sending a straightforward shot into the net to take the set 21-19.
India’s Pusarla V. Sindhu reacts after winning her match at the Riocentro stadium in Rio de Janeiro.
The scene must have been highly inspiring for all and sundry watching it at the stadium here or the millions glued in front of TV sets at home, and would act as the ideal shot-in-the-arm for Sindhu as she prepares to take on Japan’s Nokomo Okuhara in the women’s singles semifinals. At the interval, Sindhu managed a narrow 11-10 lead after her return landed at the corner of the court.
“It was anybody’s game in the first even as I was leading 18-17”. As the shuttler, jumped for joy in Rio, back at her training academy, her friends and loved ones whistled and clapped, as celebrations broke out.
“She has been training from when she was 10 years old”.
Afterwards it was a neck-and-neck contest. “After 18-all there were long rallies and it was anybody’s game”.
Sindhu had already won a tense first game 21-19.
The 21-year-old Hyderabadi kept earning points, hitting one smash after another to enjoy a comfortable ride.
Advertisement
To a query about winning 11 points in a row to win the second game she said, “It was going equal as well in the second game, until 10 points-all”. “This match has just ended, so we’ll have to go back and see what we have to do against Marin. After that the score was going equal and it was not easy to get a point for either of us, I think we both played really hard”. “Yet Sindhu remained calm and became aggressive in the last few points to finish it off”, Gopichand said. She came back through repechage and clinched the medal to become the first Indian wrestler this time to corner glory.
