press trust of india
New Delhi, March 27: Saina Nehwal sailed past Indonesia’s Hana Ramadhini to make her maiden semifinals at the India Open Super Series badminton tournament here Friday. But there was a huge upset in the men’s segment Indonesia’s Tommy Sugiarto stunned five-time World Champion Lin Dan in three tense games. India’s HS Prannoy and RMV Gurusaidutt also lost their quarterfinal games.
Saina defeated Hana 21-15, 21-12 in the women’s singles competition at the Siri Fort Sports Complex here. Prannoy, who had sent the top seed and World No. 2 Jan Jorgensen of Denmark packing out of the tournament, conjured up hopes of another upset before falling short against World No. 6 Viktor Axelsen 21-16, 9-21, 18-21 in a 58-minute contest.
Guru also started well but despite playing a compact game initially, he too ran out of ideas to go down 21-15, 18-21, 13-21 to China’s Xue Song. But in the match of the day Sugiarto won 21-17, 15-21, 21-17 against ‘Super’ Dan in a tie that lasted 62 minutes.
After plotting an early exit for Jorgensen, Prannoy was up against another Dane. He used his backhand and powerful smashes to dominate the first game but Viktor came back strongly in the second and didn’t allow the Indian to play his game. Prannoy faltered with his down the line smashes which went wide and long as the Dane roared back into the contest.
In the decider, Prannoy committed too many unforced errors as Viktor took a 11-6 lead with a smash. Even though the Dane faltered a little he did not allow the five-point lead to wither and led 19-14. Prannoy closed it down to 18-19, but two errors cost him the match.
Guru led in all the three games against Song. But every time he took the lead, the Chinese came back strongly to close it down and move ahead in the second and third games.
“I was dominating initially but then Song didn’t give me a chance to dribble and he started attacking. I took too long to realise, and could not switch to plan B,” said Guru after the tie.
Meanwhile talking after his sensational victory over Dan, Sugiarto said: “You know who Lin Dan is. He is a legend in badminton. I had lost to him thrice so I had to come up with my best,” Sugiarto said.
