Tokyo: World No.1 Pramod Bhagat sailed into the men’s singles semi-finals after beating Ukraine’s Oleksandr Chyrkov in his second group A match of the Tokyo Paralympics badminton event here on Thursday as the country’s shuttlers expectedly produced strong performances.
The 33-year-old Bhagat, also a reigning world champion, saw off Chyrkob 21-12 21-9 in 26 minutes to top his group and enter the last four in class SL3.
I was in the groove today and played really well. Oleksandr Chyrkov is a good player and played some good strokes in the match. I am very happy that I have reached the semi-finals, Bhagat said.
Things are going to be tough from here as the knock-out stages start. My focus is on one match at a time and also the last league game of the mixed doubles which is a do-or-die situation for us.Bhagat and Palak Kohli will play Siripong Teamarrom and Nipada Saensupa in mixed doubles class SL3-SU5 on Friday.
Other Indian shuttlers, including Suhas Yathiraj, Tarun Dhillon and Krishna Nagar also had a good day in office as they opened their men’s singles campaign impressively.
While Suhas and Tarun notched up easy victories over Germany’s Jan Niklas Pott and Thailand’s Siripong Teamarrom in SL4 class respectively, second seed Krishna outwitted Malaysia’s Taresoh Didin in SH6 class.
Young Palak also overcame Turkey’s Zehra Baglar in her second women’s singles match of group A. Prachi qualifies for Canoe sprint semi-finals India’s Prachi Yadav on Thursday qualified for the semi-finals of canoe sprint event in women’s Va’a single 200m. The 26-year-old from Bhopal recorded a time of one minute, 11.098 seconds – 13.014 seconds behind leader Great Britain’s Emma Wiggs (58.084s) in class VL2 heat 1 at the Sea Forest Waterway here.