Facing the biggest slump of her career, Pusarla V. Sindhu produced a version right out of her best years to take down one of the pre-tournament favourites.
Having failed to make it past the second round of her last nine tournaments, the 2019 world champion left No.2 seed Wang Zhi Yi flummoxed with her speed and shot quality. Wang, whose calendar is in stark contrast to Pusarla’s with seven finals this year, was outplayed 21-19 21-15.
Wang admitted she’d been surprised by the level of her opponent’s game today.
“I was a bit surprised by her speed. It has been a while since I played her. I did my preparation, but I have to admit that she was much better today.”
“I was prepared for everything,” Pusarla said. “I was prepared for long rallies. And also, she was sometimes changing the speed, sometimes, playing those long rallies, and then she hitting those half-smashes. So I was ready. It was important for me to be on my feet every time, because she has those surprising shot at times.
“Obviously there’s not much to prove,” she continued. “Last year or this year, in the beginning, it was not a good run for me. There were lots of ups and downs, and also there were injuries where, things have not actually happened according to what I wanted. But I think the training that I’ve done, after the earlier round exits, me and my coach discussed what was happening and I think we’ve been focusing on that.”
India had three wins to cherish; the first of which was Dhruv Kapila/Tanisha Crasto’s upset of Asian champions Tang Chun Man/Tse Ying Suet for what is their best-ever show at a major event so far.

“I think we’ve had a rough run a couple of months back, but I think we’re building together again, and it’s step by step, slowly, but I think we’re getting there, and we’re very happy with the way we played today,” said Crasto.
“We came well prepared. We didn’t give up at any point in the match, even after being down in the first game. We didn’t let it get to us. We fought back even harder, even in the second and third, and we kept pushing each other till the end, till the last shot. And I that what was the real game changer.”
In a later session came Satwiksairaj Rankireddy/Chirag Shetty’s 19-21 21-15 21-17 win over sixth seeds Wang Chang/Liang Wei Keng, stopping a sequence of four straight losses to the Chinese.
“This time, we kept on fighting every point,” said Rankireddy. “In the same situation we used to lose in the third game when we were down. But today, we stuck to the plan. Today is a positive day. In mixed doubles Dhruv and Tanisha showed fire, and I was watching the match, then Sindhu won. It was a positive sign for us. I felt like we should win as well.”