Sindhu bows out; Sen, Saina win in India Open opener

Double Olympic medallist PV Sindhu was knocked out however defending champion Lakshya Sen and London bronze medallist Saina Nehwal made profitable begins on the India Open right here on Tuesday.

World No. 7 Sindhu, a former champion, went down 12-21, 20-22 to Thailand’s world No. 30 Supanida Katethong within the Super 750 badminton match. The Indian had misplaced to the identical participant within the semi-finals of the final version.

It was Sindhu’s second first-round exit following the opening-round loss to Carolina Marin on the Malaysia Open Super 1000 final week.

World No. 12 Sen, seeded seventh, settled the rating in opposition to world No. 9 HS Prannoy after his opening-round reversal on the Malaysia Open, with a 21-14, 21-15 win on the KD Jadhav Indoor corridor in IG Stadium.

It was additionally an excellent day for former champion Saina, who eked out a preventing 21-17, 12-21, 21-19 win over world No. 24 Mia Blichfeldt of Denmark in her opening match.

Sindhu, who’s on a comeback path after recovering from a stress fracture on her ankle, didn’t take a look at her greatest as she struggled in opposition to the left-handed Supanida, who was exact in her returns and appeared in additional management within the rallies.

A poor begin noticed the Indian path 4-11 on the interval and although she diminished the deficit to 2 factors, Supanida reeled off 4 straight factors from 17-14 to take the opening sport.

Supandia, who’s coached by Sindhu’s former Korean coach Kim Ji Hyun, didn’t enable the Indian to assault, curbing her lifts and interesting her in rallies in sluggish circumstances.

The former world champion fought laborious within the second sport as she moved from 12-17 to seize one sport level at 19-20. She had, in reality, left the courtroom after the opponent’s return was referred to as out.

But a video referral confirmed that the shuttle had really kissed the road, handing her opponent an opportunity to shut the match. And she did it in fashion after Sindhu went large.

Reigning champions Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty additionally produced a medical show to storm into the second spherical after beating Scotland’s Christopher Grimley and Matthew Grimley 21-13, 21-15 of their males’s doubles opener.

The different doubles pairs, Krishna Prasad Garaga and Vishnu Goud Panjala, and Commonwealth Games bronze medallists Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand additionally claimed first-round wins.

While Krishna and Vishnu beat the Dutch pairing of Ruben Jille and Ties Van Der Lecq 21-11, 23-25, 21-19, Treesa and Gayatri notched up a 22-20, 17-21, 21-18 win over France’s world No. 29 Margot Lambert and Anne Tran of their opener.

Commonwealth Games champion Sen will subsequent tackle Denmark’s Rasmus Gemke, who knocked out two-time world champion Kento Momota of Japan 21-15, 21-11 earlier within the day.

Prannoy didn’t have an excellent begin, committing too many unforced errors to fall behind from the beginning.

Sen, then again, appeared to assault and remained regular within the rallies, producing some good winners to remain forward at 15-9.

Sen introduced down the shuttle with a thud each time it was in vary, whereas Prannoy was erratic. Soon Sen moved to 9 sport factors; he wasted three of them earlier than Prannoy went to web once more.

The second sport appeared extra aggressive firstly however Sen broke off at 9-9 and by no means appeared again.

“I could settle from the beginning, get my length and defence properly. In the Malaysia Open, I wasn’t able to control the shuttle. Today, my smashes and half smashes were working,” Sen stated after the match.

Anup Sridhar, who has been roped in to coach Sen within the pre-Olympic 12 months, stated it is vital for his ward to stay to his pure sport and make an excellent begin.

“He was a lot more confident today. We had some good sessions last week. That’s helped him. He was aggressive, attacking and taking his chances, that made the difference,” Lakshya’s new coach Sridhar informed PTI.

“He has corrected the errors that he did final week and Lakshya is an attacking participant; that’s his pure fashion. If he begins defensive then that’s not one thing that works. He wants an attacking begin.

“This year the focus will be to stay physically fit more than anything else.” Satwik and Chirag, who had claimed a semifinal end final week in Kuala Lumpur, can be up in opposition to both China’s Liu Yu Chen and Ou Xuan Yi or England’s Ben Lane and Sean Vendy.

“We would want to win 3-4 more events and reach world No. 3 this year. We want to win a major event like the All England Championships and better the medal at World Championships,” Chirag stated.

“Our main aim is to play as deep in the tournament as possible. Last week it was a semifinal finish but now our goals have changed and, when we enter the tournament, anything less than a title gives us a bittersweet taste.” Among different Indians, N Sikki Reddy and her new girls’s doubles companion Shruti Mishra went down preventing 17-21, 19-21 to Germany’s Linda Efler and Isabel Lohau.