Ace shuttler Saina Nehwal and Hydrabadi sensation PV Sindhu led Indian Badminton Women's team into quarterfinals on Sunday, after thrashing rivals Macau 3-0 in their pre-quarterfinal tie at the Gyeyang Gymnasium.
The World no. 7 had an easy win over Kit Ieng Wong 21-6 21-4 in just 21 minutes. Similarly, Sindhu didn't break a sweat seeing off Teng Iok U 21-8 21-9. The 19-year-old took 24 minutes to wrap up the match.
In the doubles encounter, the win was not easy, as N Sikki Reddy and Pradnya Gadre faced tough battle against Zhibo Zhang and Rong Wang 21-16 21-17, before they could give India a clean sweep.
The tournament suffered minor glitches and the women's singles preliminary round match of badminton was suspended for several minutes due to power cut. However, it didn't hinder India's performance as Sindhu continued to dominate her opponent later on.
"The lights turned on after two to three minutes and the matches resumed in five minutes," Asian Games official website quoted an official as saying.
Nehwal's quarter-final exit in the recent world championships in Copenhagen was a great disappointment and has made her eager to fulfill her quest of the medal this time as she is guided by Vimal Kumar after shifting base to train at the Prakash Padukone Academy. However, Sindhu won a bronze in the same event and showed some impeccable form that kept India's hopes high for the Asian Games.
"It is going to a tough event. We haven't won many medals in the past but we have done well in the last two tournaments in CWG and the World Championship. So we hope that we will get good performances in the Asian Games also," Pullela Gopichand, former Indian badminton player, said.
India will look to end a 28-year-old medal drought in Badminton. The last medal came in 1986 when the men's team won a bronze.
Meanwhile, Parupalli Kashyap failed to end India's medal drought as the Indian men's badminton team lost to South Korea 0-3 in the pre-quarterfinals on Saturday.
Kidambi Srikanth lost his match 14-21, 8-21 against world No.7 Son Wan-ho while the doubles pair, B. Sumeeth Reddy-Manu Attri, found it hard to stick to the tournament, losing 12-21, 9-21 in a match that lasted just 35 minutes.
Kashyap won the first game comfortably 21-6 but lost grip in the next two games, losing 14-21, 10-21 to world No.62 Lee Hyun Il.
