Asian Games 2018: Indian womens badminton team crash out in quarters

Indias Saina Nehwal eyes the shuttlecock against Japans Nozomi Okuhara in their womens singles match in the womenâ??s team quarter-final badminton competition at the 2018 Asian Games in Jakarta on August 20, 2018. Photo by SONNY TUMBELAKA / AFP

India crashed out of the Asian Games womens badminton team event on Monday after going down 1-3 to a formidable Japan in the quarter-finals here on Monday.

India failed to emulate their 2014 Incheon bronze medal feat here, as only Rio Olympics silver medallist P.V.Sindhu managed to pull off a narrow win over world number one Akane Yamaguchi in the singles match, while her compatriot Saina Nehwal and the women-s doubles pair of Sindhu and Ashwini Ponnappa, and N.Sikki Reddy and Arathi Sunil lost their respective matches.

In what turned out to be a close affair in the opening singles match, Sindhu got the better of Yamaguchi 21-18, 21-19. Sindhu, who took 41 minutes to put India ahead, had also beaten Yamaguchi at the recent World Championship on the way to the final. Japan equalised the affair 1-1, after Yuki Fukushima and Sayaka Hiroto thrashed the Indian pair of Sikki and Arathi in straight games to 21-15, 21-6.

Thereafter in the second singles match, Saina made a dramatic comeback to save four match points in the second game before going down to Nozomi Okuhara 11-21, 25-23, 16-21 in one hour and 11 minutes. Trailing 1-2 in the affair, India then lost the must-win fourth match, with Sindhu and Ashwini meekly surrendering 13-21, 12-21 to Misaki Matsutomo and Ayaka Takahasi.

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