At Lucknow's Babu Banarasi Das Indoor Stadium, HS Prannoy defeated Priyanshu Rajawat 21-11, 16-21, 21-18 in the second round.
To reach the semi-finals, fifth seed HS Prannoy had to fight hard against fellow countryman Priyanshu Rajawat in the 2022 Syed Modi International. At Lucknow’s Babu Banarasi Das Indoor Stadium, Prannoy defeated Rajawat 21-11, 16-21, 21-18. PV Sindhu, a two-time Olympic medalist, also advanced to the Syed Modi International 300 Tournament in Lucknow’s singles quarterfinals. Sindhu defeated American Lauren La 21-16, 21-13 in just 33 minutes in the second round.
Sindhu will face Thai shuttler Supanida Katethong in the quarterfinals, who she defeated in the Indian Open Super 500 semifinal last week. Prannoy will compete for a place in the semi-finals against Arnaud Merkle of France.
This year’s Syed Modi International 300 event is being contested under the rigorous Covid-19 guidelines. Daily RT-PCR and Rapid Antigen Tests are required of all players and officials to ensure a safe bio-bubble for the tournament to run successfully.
PV Sindhu means business at the ongoing Syed Modi International 2022 where she is hungry to win a title after having stayed without a title win since the 2019 World Championships in Basel. Making light work of her Indian opponent, Tanya Hemanth, PV Sindhu casually side-stepped the challenges thrown by Hemanth in just 27 minutes to win the opening round encounter in a 21-9, 21-9 showing.
Read More – Syed Modi International: PV Sindhu storms into quarter-finals
The double Olympic medallist that she is, Sindhu was also expected to win the title at the recently concluded India Open where her fellow Indian badminton shuttlers, Lakshya Sen and the dynamic doubles duo of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy/Chirag Shetty went on to defeat the World Champion, Loh Kean Yew and the 3-time World Champion pair of Mohammad Ahsan/Hendra Setiawan to lift the Super 500 title. However, the top-seeded Sindhu had a hiccup against Thailand’s Supanida Katethong where she lost to her in three sets, therefore, missing out on making a bid for the title.
At Syed Modi International, there has been a mass-scale withdrawal owing to a variety of factors, the most obvious of which is the mischief being caused by the COVID-19 virus, leading to the Super 300 event having a very depleted field. For World No. 7 Sindhu, this is an opportunity to get a title as she does not have much competition.