Coach backs Sindhu to regain form

PV SINDHU was at sea in the early stages of her women's singles match on Friday. Gregoria Mariska Tunjung, the shuttler on the rise in the last 12 months or so, was just the opposite and made the Indian dance to her tunes in front of a sizeable home crowd here at the KD Jadhav Indoor Hall here.

- ANMOL GURUNG @New Delhi

It was not the prescription that Sindhu, looking to retrace her old winning habits, needed. It was a mountain too steep to climb for Sindhu and she eventually conceded the game 21-9. For someone looking to rebuild her reputation, it was certainly a bad score-line. However, Sindhu flipped the script in the remainder of the match to suggest that she's here to fight or die.

Sindhu threw the kitchen sink and matched her rival, four years younger, stroke-for-stroke and took the game to the decider. The third game was a seesaw battle but Tunjung always seemed to find answers in critical moments and take the sting out of Sindhu's momentum. Sindhu persisted but that didn't pay off on the day as she lost 9-21, 21-19, 17-21. It was certainly a performance that was encouraging for Sindhu and her coach, Irwansyah, who started guiding the Indian barely a week or so back.