Seoul: PV Sindhu and Nozomi Okuhara have faced-off in an epic World Championships final three weeks ago that was rightly considered as one of the greatest women’s singles final in badminton history which lasted 110 minutes in favor of Okuhara.
After a heartbreaker in the World’s final, Sindhu got her revenge over Okuhara in the Korea Open finals on Sunday.
In another marathon final, the Indian battled for 83 minutes to see off the Japanese that seemed never get tired and capable of covering every inch of the court.
Sindhu managed to save two set points in the first set, coming back from 18-20 to win the first game 22-20.
The No. 5 seed Sindhu started to give up and get ready for the decider after she was trailed 6-12, 9-17 in the second set. Okuhara bagged the second game 21-11.
After Okuhara got off to 2-0 lead in the decider, Sindhu started smashing her way to quickly surged to an 8-4 lead. Sindhu’s net shots have confused Okuhara in several occasion, after Okuhara’s return went long, Sindhu was able to clinch the decider 21-18.
In women’s doubles, home favorite and All England champions No. 3 seeds Chang Ye Na/Lee So Hee of Korea were obviously being extremely concerned about how they performed in front of the home crowd that cheered for them, and let the pressure got into them. They made a series of uncharacteristic mistakes, were confused about the court positioning and often unsure where they should cover the court and who should return the shots from their unseeded opponents, Chinese pair Huang Yaqiong/Yu Xiaohan.
Chang/Lee eventually lost in straight sets to Huang/Yu 11-21, 15-21 in Sunday’s final at the SK Handball Stadium.
