New Delhi: With Season 2 just around the corner, we look at five great moments worth relieving from the inaugural season of the Premier Badminton League (PBL).
Srikanth beats Lee Chong Wei
In what was, arguably, the marquee clash among men in the PBL, Kidambi Srikanth had a proverbial mountain to climb in the form of mighty Lee Chong Wei. The Malaysian flew to a 5-1 lead in the first set as Srikanth found his range and fought back brilliantly to claim the first set 15-12, much to the surprise of everyone. Lee came back with a vengeance as he stamped his class to win the next 15-6. An inspired Srikanth wasn’t ready to get steamrolled in the deciding set as he stormed to an 8-3 lead by the break. He continued in the same vein and took the set 15-7 to triumph in a high-quality match though he couldn’t stop his team Bengaluru Top Guns from going down 2-3 to the Hyderabad Hunters.
Tommy ‘MVP’ Sugiarto
The Indonesian proved his pedigree in the inaugural Premier Badminton League with three Most Valuable Player (MVP) awards in the tournament for his side, the Delhi Acers. Winning all three games that he featured in, including one against Lee Chong Wei, the former world number 3 was the go-to man for Delhi in the trump matches as exhibited in the semi-final match against Chennai Smashers, helping his team overturn a 2-3 deficit to pull off a 4-3 come-from-behind triumph. In the final too, he overcame a spirited challenge from Mumbai Rockets’ HS Prannoy in a tough three-set battle to bring the Acers level at 1-1.
PV Sindhu’s blemishless record
2016 will be remembered fondly for PV Sindhu’s Olympic heroics and her resurgence began at the PBL at the beginning of the year. She almost single-handedly took the Smashers to the final with a perfect 5-0 record in the tournament. The tall Hyderabadi carried over this confidence in what eventually became the best year of her career till date. She also ended up winning the MVP award in the female category, overshadowing the likes of Carolina Marin and Saina Nehwal.
Saina Nehwal playing through injury and winning
Awadhe Warriors began the match on a disastrous note, going down in both their opening matches against Bengaluru Top Guns. Tanongsak Saensomboonsak bought the Warriors back into the match with an upset win over Kidambi Srikanth in the Top Guns’ trump match. Then, Awadhe had their opportunity for the trump match and opted to use for the Saina Nehwal-Suo Di match looking to wrest the initiative. Saina looked in discomfort in the beginning with problems in her leg and was trailing 1-4 initially. But, the Hyderabad girl fought back gallantly keeping aside her injury problems to take the first set 15-10. She showed her class in the second set to take set 15-8 and handed the advantage to her team with an unassailable 3-1 lead. Awadhe Warriors ended up winning 4-1 but Saina could no longer take part in the tournament.
An astonishing 91-shot rally in Chennai Smashers vs Delhi Acers league match
The league match between the Smashers and the Acers began with the men’s doubles match. For Chennai, doubles specialists Chris Adcock and Pranaav Jerry Chopra teamed up against the formidable Malaysian pairing of Tan Boon Heong and Koon Kiet Keat for Delhi. Adcock-Chopra had won a hard-fought first set 15-12 and the second was evenly poised at 9-7 in their favour. Then began the longest rally of the 2016 PBL as both sides displayed a full repertoire of strokes, stretching the play from back-to-front and mixing up the pace diligently. It was tiring for both teams but were unwilling to give up as the crowd got in on the act too. Eventually, it was the Heong-Keat duo who won the marathon rally but ended up losing the set 14-15 in a cliff-hanger.