Sydney: India's two-time Olympic medallist P V Sindhu, former World No. 1 Kidambi Srikanth, H S Prannoy and youngster Priyanshu Rajawat advanced to the quarterfinals of the Australian Open badminton championship while reigning national Champion Mithun Manjunath crashed out in the second round.
Sindhu, who won a silver medal in the Rio Olympic Games in 2016 and a bronze in Tokyo 2020, defeated compatriot Aakarshi Kashyap 21-14, 21-10 in a 29-minute encounter.
Srikanth registered an equally comprehensive victory, beating Su Li Yang of Chinese Taipei 21-10, 21-17 in a second-round match in Court 3 at the Quay Centre in the BWF World Tour Super 500 event.
Rajawat overcame Wang Tzu Wei of Chinese Taipei in three hard-fought games, quelling a second-game resurgence by his opponent to win 21-8, 13-21, 21-19 in 59 minutes.
H S Prannoy edged out Chinese Taipei's Chi Yu Jen 19-21, 21-19, 21-13 to seal his spot in the quarterfinals.
Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand crashed out after losing to Japanese pair Mayu Matsumoto and Wakana Nagahara 10-21, 20-22 in the doubles pre-quarterfinals.
Mithun Manjunath went down in three games to Malaysia's Lee Zii Jia. The experienced Lee won 21-13, 12-21, 21-19 in an hour.
This was Sindhu's first clash with Aakarshi and she held the upper hand throughout the match. Sindhu, seeded fifth in the event, will next face fourth seed Beiwen Zhang of Malaysia, who reached the last-eight stage with a hard-fought 19-21, 21-10, 21-12 win against Huang Yu-Hsun in a second-round clash.
Srikanth, who defeated Japan's Kenta Nishimoto 21-18, 21-7 in the first round, will meet compatriot Priyanshu Rajawat for a place in the semifinals.
Rajawat won the first game easily 21-8 by not allowing his opponent many chances. The Chinese Taipei shuttler came back strongly in the next game, winning it 21-13. Rajawat then came back strongly to wrap up the match and a place in the quarterfinals.
