**Rio de Janeiro**: India’s PV Sindhu may have lost the elusive Olympic medal by a whisker but has certainly stolen the hearts of billions of people in the country with her eye-catching performance on Friday in the badminton women’s singles finals held at Rio.
The star Indian player lost to the world No- 1 Spains’s Carolina Marin in a nail-biting match.
Carolina Marin lost the first game but made a strong comeback in the remaining two as Sindhu was forced to settle for a silver in the women’s singles event of the Rio Olympics. The final scoreline read 21-19 12-21 15-21.
The 21-year from Hyderabad started off the game quite smoothly but faced tough challenge by the Marin, who was seen playing an attacking game since the beginning of the final match.
Sindhu thus became the fourth Indian to win a silver at the Olympics after shooters Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore (2004, Athens) and Vijay Kumar (2012, London) and wrestler Sushil Kumar (2012, London).
The two-time World championship bronze medallist also became the fifth woman player from India to win a medal in Olympics and the first to clinch a silver.
Meanwhile, various eminent personalities took to twitter to congratulate the Hyderabadi suttler just she was declared the first Indian woman to clinch a silver in the Olympics.
Here’s how twitterati reacted:
Film star Rajanikant said : Hats off to you PV Sindhu; I have become a great fan of yours.
Superbly fought and what a moment of grace to walk over to the other side is the tweet message of media personality Barkha Dutt.
Wishing Sindhu, Olympic medalist and Union Minister Rajyavardhan Rathore said: “Our gratitude to Pullela Gopichand for his inspirational mentoring and his passion to create Champions.”
Cricket legend Sachin Tendulkar, who is a self-confessed badminton fan, through his tweeter said: Congrats PullelaGopichand for helping develop some wonderful Indian badminton talent to take on the world.Hats off & look forward to more!
Sindhu, who was looking calm and cool throughout the match speaking to news channels said,” I am very happy & thankful to everyone for all the support. I will celebrate when I get back.”
PV Sindhu’s coach Gopichand speaking to a private news channel said, “Sindhu is only 21. She will get better with years to come.”
