The opening round of the Hong Kong Super Series turned out to be fruitful day for the Indian contingent with their men’s singles stars Ajay Jayaram and P Kashyap recording upset victories to move into the second round.
Ajay got the better of last week’s China Super Series Premier finalist Zhengming Wang 22-20, 23-21 while Kashyap saved a match point before toppling seven seed Jan O Jorgensen of Denmark 24-22, 20-22, 22-20.
The world number 27 Ajay, wasted four game points in the first game and then saved two in the second before winning the 36 minute encounter against an opponent ranked 10 places above him.
"At game point, he started catching me with his smashes on my body and it was difficult to get good length with the drift. Also I got nervous when I lost a couple of points," he told baddyindia.blogspot.com from Hong Kong.
Wang had beaten P Kashyap, who had beaten world number three Chen Long earlier this year, in the quarterfinals of the China Open Super Series premier last week.
Later, Kashyap showed how close the race for India’s top spot is when he kept his nerves to win the first round battle in just over an hour.
The diminutive Indian dominated the back court encounters and it were smashes that saw him through against the Dane. Even Kashyap wasted four game points in the first game and saved two in the second before the match went in to a decider. He will now face Tommy Sugiarto of Indonesia in the second round.
In the day’s other matches, world number three Saina Nehwal hammered Indonesia’s Aprilla Yuswandari 22-20, 21-8 in her first match after returning from an injury break.
The Denmark Super Series Premier champion had opted out of the China Open to nurse her injured knee and was a bit rusty in the opening game. But once she got in the groove, she ensured that her Indonesian opponent had no chance of a fight back.
Saina will now face former world champion Lin Wang, who is on her comeback trail after injury.
Results:
Men’s singles:Ajay Jayaram bt Zhengming Wang (CHN) 22-20, 23-21
P Kashyap vs 7-Jan O Jorgensen (DEN) 24-22, 20-22, 22-20
Men’s doubles:
K Tarun/Arun Vishnu lost to Chris Adcock/Andrew Ellis (ENG) 21-18, 21-14
Manu Attri/B Sumeeth Reddy lost to Alvent Yulianto Chandra/Markis Kido (INA) 11-21, 21-11, 21-15
Pranav Chopra/Akshay Dewalkar bt Hafiz Faisal/Putra Eka Rhoma (INA) 21-16, 21-23, 21-17
Women’s singles:
3-Saina Nehwal bt Aprilla Yuswandari (INA) 22-20, 21-8
P V Sindhu lost to Belaetrix Manuputi (INA) 21-12, 18-21, 21-15
Women’s Doubles
Aparna Balan/Sikki Reddy lost to 2-Xiaoli Wang/Yang (F) Yu (INA) 21-3, 21-7
Pradnya Gadre/Ashwini Ponnappa bt Audrey Fontaine/Emilie Lefel (FRA) 21-10, 21-16
Mixed Doubles
K Tarun/Ashwini Ponnappa lost to 1-Chen Xu/Jin Ma 21-15, 21-16
Pranav Chopra/Sikki Reddy bt Phillip Chew/Jamie Subandhi (USA) 21-19, 21-15
Akshay Dewalkar/Pradnya Gadre lost to Fran Kurniawan/Shendy Puspa Irawati (INA) 21-18, 23-21
Arun Visnhu/Aparna Balan lost to Riky Widianto/Puspita Richi Dili 21-13, 21-11
No comments:
Post a Comment