Lagatar24 Desk
New Delhi, March 23: P V Sindhu started off her title defence with a straightforward victory against local wildcard Jenjira Stadelmann on Wednesday, but Lakshya Sen lost in straight games in the opening round of the Swiss Open, a BWF World Tour Super 300 tournament, in Basel.
In just 32 minutes, two-time Olympic medalist Sindhu beat Stadelmann to win the Commonwealth Games. The fourth-seeded Sindhu will next compete against Indonesia’s Putri Kusuma Wardani. This is the first time this season that Sindhu has advanced to the second round of an individual tournament.
Further making it to the second round were Kidambi Srikanth, H S Prannoy, Mithun Manjunath, and the men’s doubles team of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty.
In one hour and ten minutes, Srikanth—a former World Championships silver medalist—bested Weng Hong Yang of China 21-16, 15-21, 21-18. The eighth-seeded Sen, the gold medalist from the Commonwealth Games, was defeated by Hong Kong, China’s Lee Cheuk Yiu in their first-round match. Sen will now play the Indian shuttler.
Prannoy, the fifth-seeded player and last year’s finalist, defeated Shi Yu Qi of China, who finished second at the All England Open, 21-17, 19-21, 21-17, in a dramatic match that lasted one hour and four minutes. Prannoy will face Frenchman Christo Popov, who defeated Kiran George 21-14, 21-15, in the second round.
Mithun beat Dutch qualifier Joran Kweekel 21-8, 21-17 to advance to the second round as well. The next challenger for Mithun will be Chia Hao Lee of Chinese Taipei.
Satwik and Chirag, bronze medalists at the World Championships and champions of the Commonwealth Games, defeated Malaysian qualifiers Boon Xin Yuan and Wong Tien Ci 21-15, 21-18. In the second round, the second-seeded Indian team will compete against Chinese Taipei’s Fang-Chih Lee and Fang-Jen Lee.
Malvika Bansod, a qualifier, lost to Kim Ga Eun of Korea in women’s singles 14-21, 15-21, and Aakarshi Kashyap fell to Yvonne Li of Germany in women’s singles 15-21, 17-21. N. Sikki Reddy and Arathi Sara Sunil were defeated in doubles by Sayaka Hobara and Yui Suizu of Japan 12-21, 14-21.
The lone Indian team in the mixed doubles competition, Rohan Kapoor and Sikki Reddy, lost to Singapore’s Hee Yong Kai Terry and Tan Wei Han Jessica by scores of 22-20, 19-21, and 15-21.
