Top seed Sindhu eyes Malaysia Open title

Kuala Lumpur, April 29 (IANS)

Indian shuttler P.V. Sindhu will be vying for her maiden level three title at the $120,000 Malaysia Open Grand Prix Gold, where she is seeded No.1 in women’s singles.

The tournament, which kicks off here at the SUKPA Indoor Stadium Tuesday, will see the 17-year-old Sindhu take on World No.48 Jiayuan Chen of Singapore in the first round in their first ever encounter.

Her first real challenge can come in the semifinals where she will be up against Thai third seed Sapsiree Taerattanachai, against whom Sindhu has a 1-1 in career head-to-head.

Sindhu, ranked 15th in the world, is in top form, reaching her second Super Series semifinal last week at India Open.

The Indian women’s singles campaign will also be taken forward by Kerala’s P.C. Thulasi, Arundhati Pantawane and Mumbai‘s Tanvi Lad.

Meanwhile, R.M.V. Gurusaidutt, who reached the India Open men’s singles quarterfinal, has been seeded no.11 and will take on Chao huang of Singapore in the first round.

H.S. Prannoy, Sameer Verma, Abhimanyu Singh, Oscar Bansal and K. Srikanth will be the other Indians taking part in the tier three event.