Sindhu confident she can finally lift Superseries crown

INDIA’S P.V. Sindhu believes she can finally land a Superseries title this year.

The 20-year-old shuttler has five Grand Prix Gold victories to her name, but not a single Superseries crown.

Sindhu may not have to wait long after storming into the quarter-finals of the Celcom Axiata Malaysian Open by ousting seventh seed Sung Ji-hyun 22-20, 21-17 at the Malawati Stadium here yesterday.

“I’ve had two very satisfactory wins in as many days. I was able to get the better of Ji-hyun and He Bingjiao (in the first round) this time after losing to them recently,” said the world No. 10.

“I’m really happy to be in the last eight ... the best I’ve done before this was reaching the second round.

“With the Olympics coming up in August, the Malaysian Open is one of the events I’m seeking to do well in.”

Sindhu will face the recent Indian Open winner Ratchanok Intanon of Thailand for a place in the semi-finals today.

Malaysia seems to be Sindhu’s favourite hunting ground in recent years, having won the Malaysian Masters in 2013 and in January this year for two of her Grand Prix Gold triumphs.

But Sindhu’s convinced that she has the game to contend for major honours.

“It’s my goal to win as many Superseries titles as possible, especially after coming so close at the Denmark Open last year (when she lost to China’s Li Xuerui in the final),” she said.

“But winning a Superseries event is not easy. It cannot be done by just saying ‘I’m going to win it’ ... rather, it’s about how well you can perform in that week.

“How well you can adapt to the court conditions is part of the determining factor ... alongside making fewer errors, of course.

“Women’s singles is becoming more and more a wide open affair that it’s not easy to predict the winner of each Superseries event. All the top 20 ranked shuttlers can match each other. So, I believe I have a good chance of winning.” She’s spot-on. Yesterday, defending champion Li Xuerui of China and world No. 3 Nozomi Okuhara of Japan joined the list of seeded casualties.