Prannoy, Gurudutt bow out in quarters
New Delhi : Saina Nehwal and K Srikanth reached their maiden semi-finals at the India Open Super Series badminton tournament but giant-killer H S Prannoy and RMV Gurusaidutt failed to capitalise on early advantages and went down fighting in the quarterfinals on Friday.
Olympic bronze medallist, Saina sailed past Indonesia’s Hana Ramadhini 21-15, 21-12 in the women’s singles competition to stay just one win away from becoming the first Indian woman to achieve the world number one ranking.
Prannoy, who had sent the top seed and world number two Jan Jorgensen of Denmark packing, also conjured up hopes of another upset before falling short against world number six Viktor Axelsen 21-16, 9-21, 18-21.
Commonwealth Games bronze medallist, Guru had started the proceedings for India and despite playing a compact game initially, he too ran out of ideas in the end to go down 21-15, 18-21, 13-21 to China’s Xue Song in a match that lasted over an hour.
The reigning China Super Series premier champions, Saina and Srikanth, will next take on Japan’s Yui Hashimoto and China’s Xue Song respectively in the semi-finals.
Saina led 10-6 early on but Hana blasted off four straight points to catch up with the Indian. However, Saina slowly increased the gap with her rival to eventually win the first game.
The Indian dished out a better game in the second, as she entered the break with a healthy 11-4 lead and capitalised on the advantage as her opponent crumbled.
After beating Hana, Saina said: “I played her first time. She is tricky player. Indonesians have good wrist and they make you work hard. All of them are very talented, women’s singles is all about keep running.”
Asked about her inching towards world number one spot, Saina said: “It is not about the number one or number two spot right now.”
“I am concentrating on one match at a time and on winning them,” added the world number two.
Up against a familiar foe, Takuma, whom he had beaten at Swiss Open earlier this month, Srikanth dished out another superb performance. The lad from Guntur registered five straight games after enjoying a narrow 7-5 lead to zoom ahead. Takuma narrowed down the lead to 11-14 but Srikanth held his fort.
After plotting an early exit for Jorgensen, Prannoy was up against yet another Dane and he used his backhand and powerful smashes to dominate the first game but Viktor came back strongly in the second and didn’t allow the Indian to play his game. Prannoy faltered with his down-the-line smashes which went wide and long as the Dane roared into the contest.
Guru after his lost said, “I was dominating initially first game but then Song didnt me a chance to drible and he started attacking. I took too long to switch to realise, and could not switch to plan B. But i have a lot of positives to take.” —PTI
