Match Point

PV Sindhu within reach of the top

- Ajachi Chakrabarti

IN THEORY, it should have been an easy match for Pusarla Venkata Sindhu.

It was March, and the first round of the India Open, one of the Badminton World Federation’s elite Super Series tournaments, was underway. Sindhu, the world’s fifth-ranked player and an Olympic silver medallist, was pitted against the one-hundred-and-fifty-second-ranked Arundhati Pantawane. Twenty-seven-year-old Pantawane had won the gold medal at the Indian National Games in 2011, and her world ranking had peaked at number 40 in 2014, before a knee injury forced her to take 18 months off. She had made a comeback in July last year, and was playing well, but the 21-year-old Sindhu was fitter, six inches taller, in better form and a technically stronger player.

Yet, it was Pantawane who first opened up a lead. Sindhu started with a few careless errors, and after a long, nervous rally, suddenly found herself 1–4 down.

“Slow!” PV Ramana, Sindhu’s father, cried out from the stands. When I had met him earlier in March, he had told me that one of the primary reasons Sindhu lost to Tai Tzu Ying—the current world number one—at the All-England Championships this year was that once she fell behind early in the first game, she allowed her opponent to dictate the pace. Tai, who has an unhurried, almost serene playing style, and a wrist so devious that it leaves you in constant suspense about where the shuttle is going, had wasted little time between points, as Sindhu racked up unforced errors. “Later, in the car on the way back, I told her this, and she said, ‘Why didn’t you tell me during the match?’” Ramana recounted. He had tried, but had been drowned out by the loud Birmingham crowd.