Badminton Asia Championships: Lakshya Sen crashes out; Sindhu, Prannoy, Srikanth advance

Dubai: On a day star shutter Lakshya Sen made a first-round exit, double Olympic medalist P V Sindhu, top-ranked Indian H S Prannoy and veteran Kidambi Srikanth sailed into the pre-quarterfinals of the Asia Badminton Championship, here on Wednesday.

Commonwealth Games bronze medal-winning women's doubles pair Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand also kept the Indian flag high by making the last-16.

Fresh from finishing runner-up at the Madrid Spain Masters, the former world champion, Sindhu defeated Hsu Wen-chi 21-15, 22-20 in a 46-minute affair in the women's singles.

Trailing 11-14 in the first game, the world No. 11 Indian, who is on a comeback trail after a long injury lay-off, reeled off nine points in a row to take a lead.

In the second game, the Taipei shuttler gave some fight but Sindhu led 11-7 at the break before sealing the issue.

Sindhu will face World No 9 Han Yue of China in the pre-quarterfinals.

Former World Championship silver medalist Kidambi Srikanth took 25 minutes to see off his first-round opponent Adnan Ebrahim 21-13, 21-8. He will face world No. 5 Kodai Naraoka in the men's singles last-16.

World No. 9 Prannoy prevailed over Phone Pyae Naing of Myanmar 21-14, 21-9 in 32 minutes to set up a pre-quarters clash with Chico Aura Dwi Wardoyo. 

Treesa and Gayatri roared back to defeat Indonesia's Lanny Tria Mayasari and Ribka Sugiarto 17-21, 21-17, 21-18 in a match lasting more than an hour.

After losing the first game tamely, the Indians put up a dominant display in the second and began with a 5-0 lead. They maintained their lead through out to force a decider.

The third game turned out to be an intense battle with Treesa and Gayatri trailing 15-16.

They were then locked at 18-all when an aggressive Treesa came up with a powerful cross-court smash before the Indian duo sealed the issue in 64 minutes.

Mixed doubles pair of Rohan Kapoor and Sikki Reddy also advanced with a 21-12, 21-16 win over Chan Peng Soon and Cheah Yee See of Malaysia.

Commonwealth Games gold medalist Sen, who took a short break to focus on his mental and physical health, was eliminated by world No. 7 Loh Kean Yew 21-7, 23-21.

Having plummeted to 24th spot in the BWF rankings, Sen got a tough draw as he was pitted against the former world champion.

The Singaporean, who had lost to Sen in their last exchange in the Indian Open final last year, showed swift court movements to race away with the opening game.

But Sen returned stronger in the second game and was two points behind at the break.

From thereon the duo exchanged some rallies and Sen had a chance to level when he got a game point at 20-19 but Loh closed out the match in 45 minutes.

Up against world number one Akane Yamaguchi, promising Malavika Bansod stretched the star player before going down 23-25, 19-21 in a 46-minute women's singles tie.