Kiren Rijiju urges PV Sindhu not to be gutted, says 'India is proud of your achievements'

Law Minister Kiren Rijiju has urged ace shuttler PV Sindhu not to be 'disheartened' after her 18-21 12-21 semi-final loss to Chinese Taipei's Tai Tzu Ying in the women's semi-final clash of the Tokyo Olympics 2020 on Saturday.

PV Sindhu's march in the ongoing Tokyo Olympics was halted by the reigning world number one and the Indian badminton sensation is now out of gold medal contention.

Kiren Rijiju has a motivational message for PV Sindhu

Taking to the micro-blogging site, Kiren Rijiju urged PV Sindhu not to be disheartened and that India is proud of her achievements. The former Sports Minister then reminded Sindhu that she can still come back with a medal. Kiren Rijiju concluded by saying that the entire nation will be rooting for her in the bronze medal match. 

PV Sindhu can manage a podium finish and return home with the consolation prize i.e. the bronze medal provided she wins her loser's final match against  China's He Bing Jiao. In fact, in the bronze medal play-off, Sindhu will next take on world no 9 He Bing Jiao, an opponent who has beaten the Indian nine times so far in 15 meetings. Sindhu, however, had won the last time they crossed swords at the 2019 BWF World Tour Finals.

Coming back to her semi-final match, PV Sindhu was defending her silver medal that she had won at the previous edition of the quadrennial event in Rio and she had to bring her A-game against an opponent who had got the better of her on the badminton court as far as the overall head-to-head encounters are concerned but yet again the current world champion was outclassed by the top-ranked women's singles shuttler in straight sets as Tai Tzu Ying made successfully qualified for her first-ever gold medal match and she will be competing against China's Chen Yufei for winning the biggest prize of the prestigious tournament.

At the same time, this was PV Sindhu's 14th loss to Tai Tzu Ying in 19 meetings, having also lost to her in the last three face-offs.