Two-time silver medalist PV Sindhu returned to the quarter-finals of the BWF World Badminton Championship here on Thursday with a strong performance. Sindhu defeated American Beiwan Zhang 21-14, 21-6 in the women’s singles pre-quarterfinals. She took only 34 minutes to win the match. The fifth seeded Indian lost to her ninth seeded opponent in the final of the India Open last year. Sindhu will take on second seed Tai Tsu Ying of Chinese Taipei in the quarter-finals.

On the other hand, India’s top shuttler Saina Nehwal had to be eliminated on one side.Saina, who won bronze in 2017 and silver in 2015, was defeated by Denmark’s Mia Bleukfeld 15-21 27-25 21-12. After winning the first game in the match which lasted one hour and 12 minutes, Saina lost the next two games and the match. 

In the men’s singles, B Sai Praneeth put up a brilliant performance to beat world number eight Anthony Sinisuka Ginting to make it to the last eight, but K Srikkanth and HS Prannoy lost. 

World number 19 Praneeth defeated sixth seed Anthony of Indonesia 21-19 21-13 in 42 minutes. In the quarter-finals, Praneeth may face another Indonesian fourth seed and defending champion Jonathan Christie of the Asian Games. 

Seventh seeded Srikanth suffered a 14-21, 13-21 loss to Thailand’s Kantaphon Wangcharon in the pre-quarterfinals. The match lasted for 40 minutes. Earlier, Prannoy gave a tough fight to world number one Kento Momota in the first game but still could not stop the Japanese player from winning 21-19 21-12