Sayaka Takahashi stuns P. V. Sindhu to land title berth at Malaysia Open Grand Prix Gold 2012
Japan’s talented shuttler Sayaka Takahashi made her presence felt as she landed a title berth after stunning the higher ranked P. V. Sindhu of India in Women’s Singles semi-final at Malaysia Open Grand Prix Gold 2012 on Saturday, May 5, in Malaysia.
The lower ranked Sayaka, who has been playing tremendous badminton in all matches at Malaysia Open, continued her roller-coaster performance and created an upset by beating the top seed Sindhu in the semi-final encounter.
The un-seeded Sayaka displayed a phenomenal show of top quality badminton and grabbed her berth in the title match after finishing the semi-final match in straight sets by consuming just 30 minutes in the court.
On the other hand, the World Number 26 Sindhu was down as she failed to play her normal game and unexpectedly lost to her lower ranked Japanese opponent without creating a strong impact.
In the opening set, Sayaka started in an impressive was as she showed urgency in taking a reasonable lead at the early stage.
In the meanwhile, Sindhu could not match the pace of rallies and also committed a few mistakes which helped her Japanese opponent to take a tremendous lead of 11-7 until the one-minute interval.
After the break, Sindhu changed her tactics and played well at net. She managed to level the score at 13-13 but failed to set up a reasonable lead as her opponent was fully focused in the game.
Sayaka geared up her speed and placed her strokes in right areas which helped her to take the first set with a 21-19 score on the board.
The following game was quite easy for the in-form Japanese lady who showed her brilliance in the entire contest.
Until the mid-game interval, Sayaka established her commanding position in the game by taking an 11-6 lead on the board.
After the break, Sayaka remained ahead on the board without letting her higher ranked Indian rival to take over the control of rallies.
The Japanese was impressive in her play and shed ended the second game with a striking score of 21-12.
Sayaka won this semi-final match against Sindhu in a spectacular fashion by a comprehensive difference of 21-19 and 21-12.
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