Double Olympic medallist PV Sindhu’s gallant fight ended in agony as India made a dismal start to their Sudirman Cup campaign, going down to Taiwan 1-4 in their group C opening round tie here on Sunday.

There was, however, no lack of fight from the Indian players as Tanisha Crasto and K Sai Prateek started on a positive note in the mixed doubles contest but they ran out of steam in the end, losing 21-18, 24-26, 6-21 to world No. 30 Yang Po-Hsuan and Hu Ling Fang.

World No. 9 HS Prannoy then couldn’t find his ‘A’ game, losing 19-21, 15-21 to world no. 5 Chou Tien Chen as India were lagging 0-2 after the first two matches.

Sindhu was then handed the responsibility to bring India back into the tie but it was always going to be a tough task with her nemesis and former world No. 1 Tai Tzu Ying standing across the net.

The 27-year-old from Hyderabad, who hasn’t been in the best of form lately, produced a gritty performance after the opening game reversal but couldn’t go the distance with Tai Tzu managing a 21-14, 18-21, 21-17 win in an hour and four minutes.

It allowed Taiwan to take an unassailable 3-0 lead in the five-match tie.

Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty then fought hard before losing 13-21, 21-17, 18-21 to Lee Yang and Ye Hong Wei in the men’s doubles match in a little over an hour as India further slumped to 0-4.

World No 17 Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand then showed tremendous grit as they recovered from an opening game loss to eke out a 21-15, 18-21, 13-21 win over Lee Chia Hsin and Teng Chun Hsun in the final women’s doubles tie to help India avoid a clean sweep.

India will face Commonwealth Games mixed team champion Malaysia in their second Group C match on Monday.