Taipei open: Prannoy last man standing, in last-8

Taipei city, June 22

Ace Indian shuttler HS Prannoy waltzed into the quarterfinals of the Taipei Open Super 300 after recording a comfortable straight-game win over Indonesia’s Tommy Sugiarto here today.

Prannoy, the country’s top-ranked men’s singles player, took 36 minutes to dispatch former World Championships bronze medallist Sugiarto 21-9 21-17.

The world No. 9 will play Hong Kong’s fifth seed Angus Ng Ka Long in the last-eight stage.

Prannoy, who claimed the Malaysia Masters Super 300 title last month, has enjoyed a good run recently. Last week, he put up an impressive display at the Indonesia Open Super 1000 by making it to the semifinals, where he lost to world No. 1 and eventual winner Viktor Axelsen of Denmark. Prannoy is the lone Indian remaining in the competition.

Former Commonwealth Games medallist Parupalli Kashyap went down 16-21 17-21 to local favourite Su Li Yang. It was also the end of the road for the mixed doubles pair of N Sikki Reddy and Rohan Kapoor. The Indian duo was handed a 13-21 18-21 loss by Chinese Taipei’s Chiu Hsiang Chieh and Lin Xiao Min.

Tanya Kamath also didn’t pose any real threat as she went down 11-21 6-21 to the World Championships and Olympics silver medallist Tai Tzu Ying.