PV Sindhu makes early exit from Malaysia Masters as Prannoy, Srikanth advance

Double Olympic medallist PV Sindhu suffered a first-round exit at the Malaysia Masters on Wednesday, losing to Vietnam's Nguyen Thuy Linh, overshadowing a strong start by India’s male shuttlers led by H S Prannoy and Kidambi Srikanth.

Sindhu continued her poor form as she failed to get past the opening hurdle of the Super 500 tournament, losing 11-21, 21-14, 15-21 against Nguyen Thuy Linh.

Meanwhile, Prannoy and Srikanth displayed a dominant performance to qualify for the second round of the tournament, who are joined by fellow Indian Satish Karunakaran.

Taking the court first, Prannoy stunned fifth seed Kenta Nishimoto of Japan 19-21, 21-17, 21-16 in a hard-fought contest that lasted one hour and 22 minutes. The Indian will play Yushi Tanaka of Japan in the second round.

Karunakaran also registered an upset by stunning third seed Chou Tien Chen of Chinese Taipei 21-13, 21-14 in just 39 minutes. He will next face Christo Popov of France.

Meanwhile, former world no 1 Srikanth stunned a higher-ranked opponent in sixth seed Lu Guang Zu of China 23-21, 13-21, 21-11 in a 57-minute showdown to progress. Ayush Shetty also progressed after getting past Brian Yang of Canada 20-22, 21-10, 21-8.

In the mixed doubles section, the duo of Dhruv Kapila and Tanisha Crasto also moved into the second round with a 21-18 15-21 21-14 win over the Indonesian pair of Adnan Maulana and Indah Cahya Sari Jamil, but all other Indian pairs suffered defeats.

However, Ashith Surya and Amrutha Pramuthesh lost to top seeds Jiang Zheng Bang and Wei Yaxin 10-21, 12-21 in the opening round of the mixed doubles event. Rohan Kapoor and Ruthvika Shivani Gadde also lost 10-21, 14-21 to fourth seeds Guo Xin Wa and Chen Fang Hui of China.

Indonesia's Verrell Yustin Mulia and Lisa Ayu Kusumawati 15-21 16-21 showed the door to the pairing of Karunakaran and Aadya Variyath.