Veteran shuttler Saina Nehwal bows out in the first round of the Orleans Masters

Veteran Indian shuttler Saina Nehwal bowed out in the first round of the Orleans Masters BWF Super 300 tournament in France. The Olympic medallist lost to Turkey’s Nesilhan Yigit in straight games.

This was Nehwal’s first tournament since the Indonesia Open in January this year. The 32-year-old missed out on the German Open, All England, Swiss Open and the Madrid Masters in Spain.

However, she was still the favourite to win against Yigit, who is 33 places behind her in the BWF World Rankings and simply outplayed the Indian in the first-round clash. Nehwal was slow to start and hence she was on the back foot early on. However, she came back and closed the gap, making it 11-13. But Yigit had spring in her steps as she made the most of Nehwal’s errors and closed out the first game.

Nehwal’s poor run continued in the second game as she trailed by 0-4 in quick time. The Turkish shuttler was very keen to not give away the advantage to her opponent. She was excellent with her movement and dominated the rallies to put pressure on Nehwal throughout. Yigit never handed the lead to Nehwal in the second game and closed the match out with a scoreline of 21-16, 21-14 in only 39 minutes.

Apart from Nehwal, Akarshi Kashyap and Tasnim Mir also bowed out of the event. Only Tanya Hemnath progressed to the next round after she defeated French shuttler Leonice Huet 21-17, 21-18. Kashyap lost out to Japanese shuttler Natsuki Nidaira 8-21, 21-13, 8-21. While Mir fell to Yvonne Li of Germany by a scoreline of 22-20, 13-21, 5-21.

There were finally some positives as Mithun Manjunath defeated Denmark’s Victor Svendsen 24-22, 25-23 to progress into the second round of the Men’s Singles. While Priyanshu Rajawat also started with a win as he defeated his compatriot Kiran George 21-18, 21-13 to progress to the next round of the Orleans Masters.

Manjunath’s next opponent is Chinese Taipei’s Yu Jen. Jen was fortunate to make it to the second round after fifth seed Rasmus Gemke retired during their first-round clash. Meanwhile, Rajawat will have a tough outing in the second round as he will face top seed Japan’s Kenta Nishimoto. The Japanese shuttler was dominant in his first-round clash as he defeated Chinese Taipei’s Chia Hao Lee 21-11, 21-11.