Saina Nehwal lost to Michelle Li 21-15 16-21 16-21. File
Bangkok, May 20
India’s young men’s and women’s teams jeopardised their chances of qualifying for the knockout stage after suffering identical 1-4 defeats to France and Canada in their opening Group A matches of the Thomas and Uber Cup.
In the Thomas Cup, the men’s team paid the price for not fielding world No. 9 HS Prannoy and the doubles pair of Manu Attri and B Sumeeth Reddy. Consequently, the young and inexperienced team proved no match for their French opponents, who were ranked lower.
World No. 18 B Sai Praneeth gave India a positive start, defeating Brice Leverdez 21-7 21-18 to give India a 1-0 lead. In the second match, Arjun MR and Shlok Ramchandran lost 13-21 16-21 to Bastian Kersaudy and Julien Maio, ranked 47th.
Sameer Verma, ranked 21, was then handed the responsibility of bringing India back into the contest but he went down 18-21 22-20 18-21 to world No. 43 Lucas Corvee in the second singles. This gave France a 2-1 lead. Arun George and Sanyam Shukla then took the field in the second doubles match, but they were no match for Thom Gicquel and Ronan Labar, losing 10-21 12-21 in a 28-minute match. In the third and final singles match, Lakshya Sen fought hard before losing 20-22 21-19 19-21 to Toma Junior Popov. The Indian men will face Australia tomorrow.
Saina loses
The Indian women’s team had won bronze medals in the last two editions of the Uber Cup, but this time India are without PV Sindhu and doubles specialists Ashwini Ponnappa and N Sikki Reddy. This puts Saina Nehwal under a lot of pressure.
Today Saina went down 21-15 16-21 16-21 to Michelle Li in the first match to hand over a 1-0 lead to Canada. Young Vaishnavi Reddy Jakka then lost 11-21 13-21 to Rachel Honderich as Canada grabbed a 2-0 advantage. The doubles pair of Meghana Jakkampudi and Poorvisha S Ram beat Michelle Tong and Josephine Wu 21-19 21-15 in 27 minutes. But Sri Krishna Priya Kudaravalli failed to put it across Brittney Tam, losing 11-21 15-21 as Canada took an unassailable 3-1 lead.
In the fifth and final match, Sanyogita Ghorpade and Prajakta Sawant lost 15-21 16-21 to Rachel Honderich and Kristen Tsai to end their miserable outing. The women’s team will also play Australia next. — PTI
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