Kolkata: The Indians continued with their good run in the World Badminton Championships in Glasgow as ace shuttlers Saina Nehwal and Kidambi Srikanth registered dominating victories over their opponents to proceed to the pre-quarter stages of the tournament. But Sai Praneeth also fought bravely to register a hard-fought victory over Indonesian Anthony Sinisuka Ginting on Wednesday.
Saina, who had won a bronze medal for India at the London Olympics in 2012 comfortably beat Sabrina Jaquet 21-11, 21-12 in just 33 minutes to finish off the game.
After the match, the twelve seeded Nehwal said, “It was a tricky match I felt. Sabrina is a formidable opponent but I am happy that I overpowered her nicely in the match.”
“I think it is always tough to play first round but once you get used to the conditions, it gets better and better,” she further added.
Saina, who had made it to the finals of the same tournament in 2015, would now face second seeded Korean Sung Ji Hyun who went past India’s Tanvi Lad 21-9, 21-19. Nehwal would be high on confidence as she enjoys a 7-2 head to head record in her favour against Hyun and the 27-year old from Hyderabad had defeated her in June at the Australian Open this year.
Kidambi Srikanth too won in a dominating fashion over Frenchman Lucas Corvee. Both had split the first 10 points but Srikanth managed to gain an 11-6 lead. Using precise smashes, he further moved to a 19-9 advantage, before winning the first game in just 12 minutes.
In the second game, the Guntur lad put on an even more dominating performance as he raced to an 11-7 lead. Lucas then fought back to level things up at 15-15 but Srikanth went on to win the game and make it to the next stage in the competition.
However, Singapore Open champion B Sai Praneeth registered a contrasting win over Anthony Sinisuka Ginting. He had lost the first match 14-21 to the Indonesian but came up strong to win the second one 21-18 and the decider 21-19 to outplay the world number 26.
After the match, he said, “It was a very tough match. The shuttles were really slow and so the rallies went longer. I was getting caught initially and he was playing very fast. I could not match him initially but slowly adjusted to his speed. He is a tough player and his game has improved a lot since I last played him.”
He further added, “I am really happy to win and now I am focused on my next match,” added Praneeth.
The world number 19 would take on either German Mark Zwiebler or Chinese’s Taipei’s Chou Chien Chen on Thursday.
Ajay Jayaram also made his way into the pre-quarter finals after he beat Mark Caljouw of Netherlands 21-13, 21-18.
However the Indian duo of Ashwini Ponappa and N Sikki Reddy lost to Denmark’s Kamilla Rytter Juhl and Christina Pederson 22-24, 21-17 and 15-21 in the second round matches of the women’s singles event.
The Indian pair of Sanjana Santosh and Arathi Sara Sunil also lost 14-21, 15-21 to the Chinese pair of Bao Yixin and Yu Xiaohan.
Sameer Verma’s campaign too came to an end as he lost 20-22, 9-21 to England’s Rajiv Ouseph.
Earlier, the Indian pair of Meghana Jakkampudi and Poorvisha S Ram was defeated 21-13, 16-21 and 8-21 by Eefje Muskens and Selena Piek of The Netherlands.
The men’s doubles pair of Arjun MR and Ramachandran Shlok also faced 14-21, 21-19 and 14-21 defeat at the hands of Chinese Taipei’s Liao Min Chun and Cheng Heng Su.