Asian Games badminton: Walkover for Bhat, Aparna-Sivarajan make first round exit

GUANGZHOU - India’s Arvind Bhat moved into the pre-quarters after he received a walkover from Sri Lanka’s Niluka Karunaratne in his first round match. Aparna Balan and Arun Vishnu Sivarajan lost to Japan’s Shintaro Ikeda and Reiko Shiota in the mixed doubles event and crashed out of the badminton competition at the Asian Games here Wednesday.

Balan-Sivarajan lost 22-20, 7-21 and 12-21 in the first round at the Tianhe Gymnasium in an encounter that lasted 45 minutes.

In other matches of the day, Parupalli Kashyap will face Tien Minh Nguyen in the men’s singles first round and in women’s section Saina Nehwal will open her campaign against Malaysian Lydia Cheah and Aditi Mutatkar will face Japanese Eriko Hirose.

Later in the day, Sivarajan will team up with Akshay Dewalkar against South Korean pair of Yongdae Lee and Jaesung Chung in the first round of men’s doubles. Rupesh Kumar and Sanave Thomas will face Malaysia’s Kien Keat Koo and Boon Teang Hoon in their first round.