Saina, Chetan sail into third round on a day of upsets

CHENNAI - It was a virtual colour fall at the indoor stadium here as seeded players descended to the ground like autumn leaves on the opening day of the Yonex-Sunrise India Open Grand Prix (gold) badminton tournament Wednesday.

First to exit was fourth seeded Maja Tvrdy of Slovenia, followed by India’s Trupti Murgunde (7) and Aditi Mutatkar (5), and Mingtian Fu of Singapore (5) in the women’s singles.

Later in the afternoon, fifth seed Anup Sridhar of India fell to Indonesian Yusuf Alamsyah as the bloodbath continued unabated.

However, top seeds Chetan Anand and Saina Nehwal saved the blushes with fluent wins in their respective second round matches, having drawn a bye. Saina beat Thilini Jayasinghe of Sri Lanka 21-7, 21-10 while Chetan trounced Mohit Kamat 21-8, 21-8.

India’s P.C. Thulasi, runner-up at the national championship, was the most impressive among the giant-slayers as she knocked out Tvrdy in three games to advance to the second round of the women’s singles.

Thulasi, only 18 and hailing from Thrissur, Kerala, lost the first game, but her superior fitness helped her to surge back as she drew Tvrdy into long rallies and thus tiring out the Slovenian who had little to offer in the decider.

“This is my second year in the senior category and the biggest win of my career. I had been working hard for the past three weeks for this tournament under coach Pullela Gopichand,” Thulasi said.

“After losing the first game due to some simple mistakes, I maintained the pace in the next two to win. This is a good chance for me to improve my ranking by gaining crucial points as top international players are not in the fray,” she added.

“I have been training at Hyderabad for the last three years in the national camp. I now need to improve my strength and stamina,” said Thulasi.

Murugunde seemed to run out of steam as she lost 15-21, 15-21, to Singapore’s Gu Juan while Aprilia Yuswandari brought some cheer to Indonesian camp as she ousted Fun 21-13, 22-20.

The results (prefix denotes seeding):

Men’s singles (1st round): Saurabh Verma (IND) bt Ravinder Singh (IND) 21-8, 21-12; Sourav Kapoor (IND) bt T Nagendra (IND) 21-11, 21-18; Seang Tan Chun (MAS) bt Anthony T Joy (IND) 21-11, 21-2; Sai Praneeth B (IND) bt Vipul Saini (IND) 21-4, 21-15; Arvind S (IND) bt Naqvi Eshan (IND) 19-21, 21-13, 21-13; Ashish Sharma (IND) bt Yasin Marwan Saada (EGY) 21-16, 21-12; Abhimanyu Singh (IND) bt Tanveer Gill (IND) 29-27, 21-15; Yunus Alamsyah (INA) bt JBS Vidyadhar (IND) 21-14, 21-17; Aditya Elango (IND) bt Oon Hoe Keat (AUS) 21-10, 8-21, 21-13; MR Manikandan (IND) bt Vikram Saini (IND) 21-5, 21-6; Kiran Kumar Behara (IND) bt Manish Gupta (IND) 21-16, 21-18; Nigel D’Sa (IND) bt Youssef Marwan Saada (EGY) 21-3, 21-7; Srujan Nandaluri bt Tawfeek Ahmed Badie (EGY) 21-1, 21-11; Tanishak Karuppannan (IND) bt Prem Singh (IND) 19-21, 21-16, 21-8;

Second round: Saurabh Verma (IND) bt Saurav Kapoor 21-8, 21-15; Seang Tan Chung (MAS) bt Sai Praneeth (IND) 21-9, 21-15; 8-Ajay Jayaram (IND) bt Prannoy HS (IND) 21-16, 9-21, 21-8; Abhimanyu Singh (IND) bt Arvind S (IND) 21-19, 21-14; 4-Arvind Bhat (IND) bt Rohan Casetellino (IND) 21-14, 21-15; 7-RMV Guru Saidutt (IND) bt Arurag Sharma 21-8, 21-9; Yunus Alamsyah (INA) bt 5-Anup Sridhar (IND) 21-12, 21-8; MR Manikandan (IND) bt Ashish Sharma (IND) 21-11, 21-9; 1-Chetan Anand (IND) bt Mohit Kamat 21-8, 21-8; Pratik Patel (IND) bt Nigel D’Sa (IND) 21-18, 21-16; Tanishak Karuppannan (IND) bt Kiran Kumar Behara (IND) 21-11, 14-21, 21-9; Aditya Elango (IND) bt Gauranshu Chopra (IND) 21-8, 21-18; Srujan Nandaluri (IND) bt Oscar Bansal (IND) 21-13, 21-10; 6-Anand Pawar (IND) bt Sagar Chopda (IND) 21-17, 7-1 (retd); Muhammad Hafiz Hashim (MAS) bt Ajit Wijetilak (IND) 21-12, 21-8.

Women’s singles (1st round): 6-Sayali Gokhale (IND) bt Sampada Sahasrabudhe (IND) 21-7, 21-11; Dhanya Nair (IND) bt Noran Hassan El Banna (EGY) 21-5, 21-11; Sindhu PV (IND) bt Juhi Devagan (IND) 21-12, 21-8; Gayatri Vartak (IND) bt Jui Agaskar (IND) 19-21, 21-10, 21-9; Mohita Sehdev (IND) bt Trupti Lavaniya (IND) 21-15, 21-12; Tulasi PC (IND) bt 4-Maja Tvrdy (SLO) 17-21, 21-9, 21-10; Gu Juan (SIN) bt 7-Trupti Murgunde (IND) 21-15, 21-15; Simone Prutsch (AUT) bt Neha Pandit (IND) 12-21, 21-13, 21-14; Renuga Veeran (AUS) bt Anita Ohlan (IND) 21-18, 21-17; Aprilia Yuswandari (INA) bt 5-Mingtian Fu (SIN) 21-13, 22-20; Sanyogita Ghorpade (IND) bt Asmaa Badie Tawfeek (EGY) 21-4, 21-6; Lindaweni Fanetri (IND) bt 3-Aditi Mutatkar 21-14, 18-21, 21-11; 2-Mew Choo Wong (MAS) bt Mudra Dhainje (IND) 21-13, 21-15; 1-Saina Nehwal (IND) bt Thilini Jayasinghe (SL) 21-7, 21-10; 8-Jiayuan Chen (SIN) bt Saili Rane (IND) 17-21, 21-14, 21-15.

Men’s doubles (1st round): SDS Krishna/Vineeth Manual (IND) bt Avnish Sharma/Rahul Sharma (IND) 21-7, 21-11; Berry Angriawan/Muhammad Ulinnuha (INA) bt Raviraj D/Sunil Verma (IND) 21-16, 21-11; Ravinder Singh/Utsav Mishra (IND) bt Alwin Francis/Sanker Panikkassery (IND) 11-21, 21-11, 21-16; KS Hersen/Jayan James (IND) bt Mohit Kamat/Venkatesh Prasad Subbanna (IND) 21-17, 21-19; Afiat Yuris Wirawan/Rendy Sugiarto (INA) bt Dinesh Thirupati/Kiran Kumar Behara (IND) 21-11, 21-16; Jishnu Sanyal/Manu Attri (IND) bt Yasin Marwaan Saada/Youssef Marwaan Saada (EGY) 21-2, 21-12; Mohd Rizki Delynugraha/Muhammad Rijal (INA) bt Antony T Joy/Suraj Pottathil 21-18,21-7; Ong Soon Hock/Hoon Thien How (MAS) bt Antony Bennet Anchery/Vijay C Ram (IND) 21-7, 21-11; Pranav Chopra/Tarun Kona (IND) bt Tanishak Karuppannan/JBS Vidyadhar (IND) 21-11, 21-23, 21-13.

Women’s doubles (1st round): Jyotsna Polavarapu/Pradanya Gadre (IND) bt Fu Mingtian/Yan Vanessa Neo Yu (SIN) 21-19, 21-15; 3-Kashyap Parupalli (IND) bt Dinesh Thirupati 21-11, 21-12; Chandrika De Silva (SL) bt Diksha Mahajan (IND) 21-5, 21-8.

Mixed Doubles (1st round): Ricky Widianto/Jenna Gozali (INA) bt Vikram Saini/Diksha Mahajan (IND) 21-5, 21-9; KS Hersen/Meenakshi Nair (IND) bt Ahmed Badie Tawfeek/Asmaa Badie Tawfeek (EGY) 21-7, 21-4; Tarun Kona/Ashwini Ponnappa (IND) bt Youssef Saada Marwan/Noran Hassan El Banna (EGY) 21-8, 21-9.