Two-time Olympic medallist PV Sindhu saw off the challenge from Bulgaria’s Kaloyana Nalbantova to sail into the second round of the BWF World Championships 2025 badminton tournament in Paris on Tuesday.
PV Sindhu, 15th in the badminton rankings for women’s singles, beat world No. 69 Nalbantova by a 23-21, 21-6 scoreline in 39 minutes.
The Indian badminton player, who has largely struggled for form this season, started off slowly against her 19-year-old opponent and trailed by four point at the first interval.
Sindhu fared better after the restart, and strung together a sequence of seven unanswered points to edge ahead 14-12.
However, Nalbantova, a two-time junior European champion and a Paris 2024 Olympian, didn’t baulk under the pressure and fought Sindhu right till the end.
The Indian veteran was forced to save two game points before she could secure the marathon opener in 23 minutes.
Riding high after coming out on the right side of an incredible exchange, Sindhu opened the second game with four successive points.
The Bulgarian youngster, yet again, fought back to reduce the deficit to 6-5 before Sindhu embarked on an incredible run of 14 straight points before Nalbantova could break the streak.
Sindhu, however, took the next point to close out the match. The 30-year-old will play either Hong Kong China’s Saloni Samirbhai Mehta or Karupathevan Letshanaa of Malaysia in the second round.
A former badminton world champion from 2019, Sindhu is on the hunt for her sixth medal from the global showpiece. She won back-to-back bronze medals in 2013 and 2014 and logged consecutive runners-up finishes in 2017 and 2018.