Tanvi Sharma’s inaccuracy in line smashes costs her Syed Modi semifinals against Hina Akechi

The World Juniors runner-up has the potential to set up the opponent, wrong-foot them and put them into grave discomfort. But she can fritter chances, allowing nervy inaccuracy to come in her way. Coach Park Tae Sang will be unhappy.

Tanvi had been nailing the same flat, deep smashes until then, but it was clearly lack of composure that saw her fail to push a decider, and moments like those can be the difference between a title, like Saina Nehwal’s at the Philippines 20 years ago, and Tanvi contesting a Super 300 final to take the next step.

While the Indian trailed by 4 points at crucial junctures in the opener against the tactically sounder Japanese, ranked World No 40, she had her chances in the second.

Hina Akechi had the natural directional advantage of her southpaw stroke angles. But she is also deceptively powerful on her smashes – which she peppered towards the lines, even testing Tanvi’s forehand reach in the opening game. Her court movement and variety in changing directions through crisscrosses also bothered the Indian as she couldn’t quite maintain leads after securing them twice in the match.

The shuttler from Osaka led 8-4 and 19-15 but Tanvi had her opportunities bridging the gap to 14-16 before she lost the first set.

The second set saw a fightback. Tanvi, 0-4 down, went on a run of 6 points, with a spirited uptick in speed and grabbing of initiative. She belongs to the top tier of the sport in terms of speed and nous, knows it too, but tends to fortify her skilled strokeplay with stubborn rigour. Her winners are impressive, but the loose errors can easily outnumber them, and ruin all the hard work and talent.

The promising Indian has further polished her flat smashes that travel almost parallel to the floor inches over the net tape, since her World Juniors campaign. Those can be quite unretrievable given the zing imparted on them. The stroke-filled Indian can also conjure net tumbles that trap opponents and has reliable drops close to the net. But her net defense isn’t half as formidable, so when Akechi dribbles back in kind, Tanvi struggled.

The left handed Akechi could pin Tanvi to her backhand with down hits and her dribbles tangled up the Indian. A lot of it is to do with the striding to the front court, where Tanvi is unable to commit to the net while still being confident of being able to track back if needed. Coach Park will have to hyperfocus on what is clearly a strong area, with a few chinks that can chip at her confidence.

Still, Tanvi did well to go from 0-4 to 6-4, before she dropped off to 7-12 and again clambered back to 15-15. Going for the lines boldly and soaking up the net pressure, the Indian arrived at 16-16. The accuracy issue at that point when she sprayed the smash overhitting it, cast a shadow on the remainder of the game, and Akechi went about coolly constructing points.

Patience was lacking in Tanvi, who allowed desperation to cause more mistakes and it was soon 16-20, and a review gave the Japanese a chance at the title making the finals.

Another of those Park-lessons will need to be on taking reviews, given how she burnt them twice early in the opener, and sponging energy off the home crowd, and making the most of home conditions.

As a gifted stroke maker, Tanvi Sharma would hate to fritter chances on simple (simple to correct) mistakes of execution, like accuracy, after she reads games so well.

Earlier, Treesa Jolly and Hariharan Amsakarunan lost to Indonesians Bernadine-Dejan 21-17, 21-19 in mixed doubles.