PV Sindhu, India’s badminton ace, confessed that the stress is running high at the Tokyo Olympics, and that she will be the target.

The 26-year-old world champion, who won silver at the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio, will compete for gold against Israel’s Ksenia Polikarpova on Sunday.

With Rio Olympic champion Carolina Marin ruled out of Tokyo due to a major knee injury, world number seven Sindhu is one of the favourites in what appears to be a wide-open race.

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“There is definitely a lot of expectation. There are a lot more responsibilities and definitely there will be pressure,” said the Indian, reflecting on her status as reigning world champion.

“I’m sure a lot of people are going to look for me because, even the last time in 2016 (Rio), I was not a known person,” she said.

“But I think now people are looking at me and knowing my game. I think it’s comparatively tough and it’s not going to be easy,” the ace badminton player added.

Sindhu will be India’s second individual Olympic gold medalist in the Games’ history if she wins the championship in Tokyo.

Other gold medal candidates in Marin’s absence include Taiwan’s world number one Tai Tzu-ying, China’s Chen Yufei, and the Japanese duo of Nozomi Okuhara and Akane Yamaguchi.

The pandemic-affected Tokyo Olympics, which had been postponed because of the coronavirus, will go off with the opening ceremony later Friday.  

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International Olympic Committee has released guidelines on how matters of COVID-19 positive athletes would be dealt with in case the infection is found while the matches were on. 

In case an athlete or a team test positive for coronavirus while being present at the site of the games and are compelled to withdraw their participation, they would not be classified as ‘disqualified’ but be put into the ‘did not start (DNS)’ category. 

India has sent a 228-strong contingent for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, including 127 athletes. The total number of athletes includes two alternate players, one reserve goalkeeper for both the men’s and women’s hockey teams across 18 disciplines.