Tokyo: Fatigue caught up with both World No. 1 Tai Tzu Ying of Taiwan and India’s World No. 3 P.V. Sindhu as both Asian Games gold and silver medalists were upset in the second round of Japan Open on Thursday.
Tai who won the Asian Games women’s singles title in Jakarta two weeks ago, losing to World No. 33 Chen Xiaoxin of China 18-21, 14-21 in 40 minutes.
Although this was the only the third defeat of Tai Tzu Ying in the 2018 season (she lost to Ratchanok Intanon in the Asian Games team event, went down to He Bingjiao of China at the World Championships in Nanjing), she looked exhausted and made a lot more unforced errors than usual. Chen Xiaoxin took full advantage of Tai’s mistakes to finally won in straight games.
Chen will meet No. 8 seed Nozomi Okuhara of Japan on Friday.
The No. 3 seed PV Sindhu of India was another top women’s singles to surrender in the second-round as she was outlasted by unseeded Gao Fangjie of China 18-21, 19-21.
Other women’s singles top seeds including Carolina Marin, Ratchanok Intanon, Akane Yamaguchi, Chen Yufei all through to the quarter-finals.
No. 5 seed Chen Yufei will take on No. 2 seed Akane Yamaguchi while No. 4 seed Ratchanok Intanon will fight No. 6 seed Carolina Marin on Friday for a spot in the semi-final.
