INDIAwomen's badminton team will have a chance to assure a medal on Tuesday. However, they'll have to bring their A game as the team will take on Japan, who have a formidable line-up which includes World No 3 Akane Yamaguchi.
Double Olympic medallist PV Sindhu will meet Yamaguchi in the first singles. This match promises to be a fascinating contest as both have had successes while facing each other this year. In four meetings this year, both have won two each with the Indian winning their most-recent meeting in July. Sindhu had beaten her familiar foe in the final of Japan Open to clinch her first title of the season. Though that was played in a different venue, that win had arrived in the Island nation and Sindhu will be hoping to draw inspiration from that performance. Yamaguchi, meanwhile, has three titles to her name and she'll be looking to avenge that defeat.
World Championships bronze medallists Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand will then take the court against World No 3 pairing of Yuki Fukushima and Mayu Matsumoto.
Then it will be a clash of youngsters as Unnati Hooda will be up against Tomoka Miyazaki in the second singles match. Miyazaki, on paper, has the upperhand but Unnati will be hoping to rise to the occasion.
In the second women's doubles match, Sindhu will join forces with Tanisha Crasto. They will take on Rin Uesaka and Kie Nakanishi.
The last match will be a battle of youth and experience as teenager Tanvi Sharma, who recently captured her first Super 300 crown, takes on Rio Olympics bronze medallist Nozomi Okuhara in the third women's singles.
Whosoever wins the contest will be assured of at least securing a bronze medal on the basis of reaching the last-four stage.
The men's team, who blanked Bangladesh 3-0 on Monday, will also face Japan at the same stage on Tuesday.
Lakshya Sen, Ayush Shetty and former World No 1 Kidambi Srikanth won their respective matches on Monday to help the team beat Bangladesh. However, Japan will be a much stiffer test as they boast some strong talents like Kodai Naraoka (World No 7), Koki Watanabe (World No 16) and Yushi Tanaka (World No 18). Naraoka will most-likely meet Lakshya while Watanabe could take on Ayush. In the first doubles event, Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty, winners of China Masters, are expected to face the combination of Yugo Kobayashi and Takuro Hoki, who are ranked World No 9.
Both the matches could go down to the wire.