Badminton Asia Championships 2025: PV Sindhu, Priyanshu Rajawat Enter Second Round After Contrasting Wins

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Two-time Olympic medallist Indian shuttler PV Sindhu saw off Indonesia's Ester Nurumi Tri Wardoyo to reach the pre-quarterfinal stage of the Badminton Asia Championships 2025 on Wednesday (April 9) at the Ningbo Olympic Sports Center Gymnasium in Ningbo, China.

Sindhu registered a straight games win over the Indonesian shuttler by a scoreline of 21-15, 21-19 in the women's singles opening round match that lasted 44 minutes on Court 4. The 29-year-old will next face third seed Akane Yamaguchi of Japan on Thursday (April 10).

Sindhu remains the lone Indian in women's singles competition after Malvika Bansod, Aakarshi Kashyap and Anupama Upadhyaya suffered first round exits following straight games defeats in their respective matches earlier in the day.

Also exiting the tournament early were experienced men's singles duo of HS Prannoy and Lakshya Sen. However, the men's singles challenge at the 2025 Badminton Asia Championships for India was kept alive by Kiran George and Priyanshu Rajawat, who registered a comeback win to seal his second round spot.

Rajawat fought back from a game down to get past Kantaphon Wangcharoen of Thailand in the men's singles opener. The 23-year-old India, who lost the opening game 20-22, showed tremendous resilience to win the next two games 21-12, 21-10 to win the hour and 21 minutes contest.

The 2023 Orleans Masters champion Rajawat will next face Kodai Naraoka of Japan in the pre-quarterfinal on Thursday (April 10) when George will be in action against Thai shuttler Kunlavut Vitidsarn in the round of 16.

Earlier on Wednesday (April 9), George eased past Kazakhstan's Dmitriy Panarin to reach the second round with a straight games victory by the scoreline of 21-18, 21-8 in the men's singles opener.

Sindhu, George and Rajawat will look to keep India's singles challenge alive when they take to the court on Thursday (April 10), while mixed pairs of Dhruv Kapila-Tanisha Crasto and Ashith Surya-Amrutha Pramuthesh will look to do similar in doubles along with men's doubles pair of Hariharan Amsakarunan and Ruban Kumar Rethinasabapathi.