Saina knocked out, Aakarshi advances
Orleans (France), April 5
London Olympics bronze medallist Saina Nehwal crashed out of the Orleans Masters Super 300 with a straight-game first-round loss to Turkey’s Neslihan Yigit here today.
However, Mithun Manjunath, Priyanshu Rajawat, Aakarshi Kashyap and Tanya Hemanth progressed to the second round.
Returning to the court after missing a few tournaments, Nehwal went down 16-21 14-21 to the Turkish qualifier Yigit in 39 minutes.
Nehwal, who missed the All England Championships and has dropped to 32 in the BWF Rankings, was playing with a heavily strapped right knee.
She looked sluggish and was slow off the blocks as she trailed Yigit 4-11. The Indian, however, fought back to narrow down the deficit to 13-15 but the gap was eventually too much as Yigit took the first game.
A rusty Nehwal was down again in the second game, trailing 6-11 at the mid-game interval, and eventually lost the tie in straight games.
In the other women’s singles matches, Tanya eked out a 21-17 21-18 win over Leonice Huet of France, while Aakarshi fought from a game down to beat Japan’s Natsuki Nidaira 8-21 21-13 8-21. Tanya went down fighting to Germany’s Yvonne Li 22-20 13-21 5-21.
In the men’s singles, Manjunath defeated Victor Svendsen of Denmark 24-22 25-23, while Rajawat beat compatriot Kiran George 21-18 21-13.
Sameer Verma, on the other hand, squandered a game’s lead to lose 19-21 21-19 21-17 against Ireland’s Nhat Nguyen. Manjunath will play Taipei’s Yu Jen, who was lucky to progress after fifth seed Rasmus Gemke retired in the second game after pocketing the first.
Rajawat will be up against top seed Kenta Nishimoto of Japan, who prevailed over Taipei’s Chia Hao Lee 21-18 21-11.
