Glasgow: P Kashyap stood just a win away from winning a historic gold while 2010 champions Jwala Gutta and Ashwini Ponnappa, too, were on course to defend their title, but young P V Sindhu suffered a heartbreaking loss in badminton competition of the Commonwealth Games here today.
World No. 22 Kashyap played out of his skin to avenge his loss to England's Rajiv Ouseph, who had beaten him at the 2010 Delhi Games and also dumped him during the mixed team event at the Emirates Arena here.
In an energy-sapping one hour and 23 minute match, Kashyap bounced back from a game down to edge out World No. 26 Ouseph 18-21 21-17 21-18 and assure himself of at least a silver medal.
Delhi Games gold medallist pair of Jwala and Ashwini too notched up an easy 21-7 21-12 win over Lai Pei Jing and Loo Yin Lim in the women's doubles semifinals to set up a final showdown with World No. 18 Malaysian combo of Vivian Kah Mun Hoo and Khe Wei Woon.
However, Sindhu, who is playing her first Commonwealth Games, could not go the distance in women's singles as she went down fighting to Michelle Li of Canada 22-20 22-20 in the last-four encounter.
This was her second defeat to Li in the tournament. The Indian had lost to the Hong Kong-born shuttler in the mixed team event.
The Hyderabad girl will meet Malaysia's Jing Yi Tee in the bronze medal contest later in the day. Jing was defeated by World No. 17 Kirsty Gilmour from Scotland in the other semifinal.
It could have been an all-Indian final showdown in the men's singles but RMV Gurusaidutt could not recreate the same magic which saw him beat top seed Chong Wei Feng of Malaysia last night in the quarterfinals.
After battling for more than an hour, Guru finally went down 21-16 19-21 15-21 against World No. 40 Derek Wong of Singapore in the other semifinals.
London Olympics quarterfinalist, Kashyap will now take on Wong in the summit clash tomorrow.
