Saina Nehwal eliminated from Thailand Open

Indian shuttler Saina Nehwal crashed out of the Thailand Open on Thursday as she lost 23-21, 14-21, 16-21 in the second round to Thai star Busanan Ongbamrungphan.

Both shuttlers battled for over an hour in the match. Even though Saina won the first game, she failed to make an impact in the next two.

The World No.20 earned a hard-fought win in the first game as well. She conceded a 9-11 lead at the mid-game break but bounced back strongly to win in 23-21 within 26 minutes.

Saina didn’t get any chance to dominate after the first game, though. Ongbamrungphan won the second game in a convincing manner and she maintained the same level of domination in the third game as well. The win helped the Thai star to enter into the quarterfinals.

Saina, however, had registered a convincing 21-15, 21-15 first-round win against Kisona Selvaduray of Malaysia.

Unfortunately, India’s hopes in the tournament ended with Saina’s ouster. All of the Indian players have now crashed out of the tournament, be it the men’s event or the women’s one. PV Sindhu had lost her first round match 21-16, 24-26, 13-21 to world No.18 Mia Blichfeldt on Wednesday.

Even though Kidambi Srikanth made it to the second round comfortably, he had to pull out of the event due to a calf muscle strain. He was supposed to take on Malaysia`s Lee Zii, who eventually got a walkover.

“Right Calf muscle pull. So gave walkover for today’s match. Should see how he improves in the next 5 days and then will decide about his participation in the next tournament,” BAI’s official statement on Srikanth’s walkover read.

The men’s doubles pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty, who had entered into the second round, suffered straight-games defeat. They lost 19-21, 17-21 against the Indonesian duo of Mohammad Ahsan and Hendra Setiawan. The match lasted for a total of just 34 minutes.