CHENNAI: Indian badminton continued to receive reality checks as PV Sindhu and Saina Nehwal exited at the quarterfinal stage of the Malaysia Masters on Friday. Both players faced tough tests. The former was up against Tai Tzu-ying while the latter had to contend with Carolina Marin.
And true to form, both of them were dispatched in straight games. While Sindhu lost 16-21, 16-21, Saina was blown away 8-21, 7-21.
Both matches were one-sided, as the scores indicate. Indians have had a problem whenever they have faced Tai, and Friday was no different. The 2016 Olympics silver medallist ceded ground to trail 3-6 at the start. Sindhu never recovered from that early setback even though the scores were level for a brief while. She did win a couple of points through her famed smashes, but the Chinese Taipei athlete’s flicks, deception and drops found Sindhu wanting a number of times. It was like watching a student try to solve a complex math paper and fail.
Saina’s loss was even more brutal. She couldn’t even live in the same postcode as Marin. It looked like, at least on TV, that the 29-year-old was slower in everything. Her unforced-error count kept increasing at the rate of knots. The Spaniard, who is now on a 13-match winning run, asphyxiated Saina at the source and the 2012 Olympics bronze-medallist threw in the towel. At one point in the second game, she lost 12 of 13 points. That was how hapless she was.
This is the latest in a long line of disappointments the Olympic medallists have faced. In 19 tournaments that Sindhu has played since the beginning of 2019, she has progressed beyond the quarterfinals just four times.
Sure, the 24-year-old managed to win the Worlds in that time. But this is a worrying loss of form, especially in an Olympic year when seedings could play an important role. Saina’s recent record is even worse. In 17 tournaments in the same time period, she has gone beyond the last-eight stage just once. Not exactly form that screams inspirational.
With just nine tournaments to go before the Olympic cut-off (April 26), time is running out for two of the country’s foremost badminton exponents to get back up to speed. They are still odds on to qualify, but a prolonged dip in form could cause problems.