PV Sindhu crashes out in All England Championship 2021 semi-final

Reigning world champion PV Sindhu missed out on an opportunity to reach her maiden final at the All England Championships as she was outclassed in straight games by Thailand's Pornpawee Chochuwong in just 45 minutes in the women's singles semi-final in Birmingham on Saturday.

PV Sindhu went down 17-21, 9-21 to 6th seed Ponrpawee Chochuwong without a fight as her campaign at the prestigious Super 1000 tournament came to a disappointing end. Notably, this was only Sindhu's 2nd defeat in 6 meetings to Chochuwong, who is certainly on the rise. The Thai shuttler had reached the semi-final of the World Tour Finals. She will face the winner of the other



semi-final between Thailand's Ratchanok Intatnon and Nozomi Okuhara.

It was surprising to see Sindhu looking jaded and unable to cover the court and match the intensity of her Thai opponent in the one-sided semi-final on Saturday. Sindhu began with the slower side of the court and Chochuwong seized the early momentum by going into the break at 11-7. The change of ends did not make much of a difference as the Thai star went up to 14-7 before Sindhu made a mini-comeback. However, the Indian shuttler was not able to close out the first game.

In the second game, Sindhu had no answers to Chochuwong's attacking display as the match was over in 45 minutes.