Guangzhou: The dream run of PV Sindhu came to an end at World Badminton Championships as she lost to Thailand's Ratchanok Intanon in the semi-final in Guangzhou, China on Saturday. It was more of a one-sided affair as the 18-year-old Hyderabadi failed to put up a fight and consequently ended up losing by 10-21, 13-21.

Sindhu’s resistance lasted just 35 minutes against World No. 3 Intanon, who became the first shuttler to enter the finals of a World Championship. Intanon will now take on the top-seed Chinese Li Xuerui.Read More

Sindhu, however, still managed to win the bronze medal and created a history after she won her match against a former World No. 1Wang Shixian on Friday. With this bronze medal she became the first Indian woman ever to win a singles bronze at World Championships. The only other Indian to win a world bronze was Prakash Padukone in 1983. Jwala Gutta and Ashwini Ponappa had won a doubles bronze in 2011 at Wembley.

Intanon didn’t allow Sindhu to get settled and took a 10-4 lead as a result, the Thai won the first game in over 13 minutes. The Thai shuttler kept on coming with longer rallies and well timed drop shots, which were enough to put the Indian on the back-foot. Sindhu’s game was not even a shadow of what she played in her previous encounter with former World Number 1.

With one game down, a better fight was expected from Sindhu, but sadly she was not good enough to pull the bunny out of hat as Intanon took a lead of 7-1. Sindhu did try hard but directionless efforts only managed to get her shuttle either out of the court or on the nets. There was a transition when she looked to make that desperate comeback as Inanton was committing some mistakes, but the Thai got her act together and with a brilliant smash she sealed her berth into the finals of the World Championships.