HYDERABAD: Second seed Saina Nehwal crashed out of the $120,000 Yonex- Sunrise India Open Gold Grand Prix Badminton Championship here on Friday.
In a gripping 55-minute women’s singles quarterfinal contest, Julia Pei Xian Wong of Malaysia beat Saina 12-21, 21-13, 21-18 at the SAAP Indoor Stadium at Gachibowli.
However, there was something to cheer about for the home team as second seeded pair of V Diju and Jwala Gutta marched into the mixed doubles semifinals with a 21-13, 21-13 win over Tao Jiaming and Xiaoli Wang of China. Jwala then combined with Shruti Kurien to score a 21-19, 21-16 win over Chiou Hwee Chiou (Malaysia) and Li Yujia (Singapore) to move into the women’s doubles semifinals.
But Saina’s shock defeat was the biggest flop story of the day. “I made a few silly mistakes,” Saina said. Chief coach Pullela Gopi Chand said: “She wanted to finish off the match early and as a result fell into the trap.” Saina fumbled at the start. She trailed 2-6. But then she found her groove as her smashes and the drop shots got going. Saina reeled off winners with amazing ease.
Wong changed her tactics. She began to play a more aggressive game. That had Saina in two minds. She started making unforced errors. She misjudged the flight and quite often played into the net. Wong began to execute some deadly forehand and half line backhand smashes.
In the third game players were even at 11-all but Wong took firm grip of the match with a string of smashes and Saina could never recover. Top seed Pi Hongyan of France overcame Xia Jingyun 22- 20, 18-21, 21-18.
Second seed Taufiq Hidayat of Indonesia beat Kuan Beng Hong of Malaysia 17-21, 21-17, 21-19. Sugiarto ousted Tan Seang Chun 13-21, 21-18, 21-9. China’s Chen Long beat Lee Seng Tsuen of Malaysia 21-15, 21-8. Long clashes with Muhammad Hafiz Hashim who defeated Andre Kurniawan Tedjono (Indonesia) 21-18, 14-21, 21-16.