India’s ace shuttler Saina Nehwal sailed into the quarterfinals with a straight game victory but it was curtains for Parupalli Kashyap and P.V Sindhu in the second round of the Korea Open Super Series Premier here today.
Olympic bronze medallist Saina took 36 minutes to brush aside Mingtian Fu of Indonesia 21-16 21-9 in the women’s singles at the SK Handball Stadium here.
World number three Saina will next take on Lin Han of China, a player against whom she has a 2-0 record. Han beat Tzu Ying Tai of Chinese Taipei 21-16 21-16 in another match.
Olympic quarterfinalist Kashyap played his heart out and was one game up but seventh seed Yun Hu of Hong Kong came from behind to notch up a 16—21 21—13 21—17 victory over the Indian in the men’s singles.
World number 17 Sindhu also failed to cross the second round after she went down 19—21 13—21 to Thailand’s Porntip Buranaprasertsuk in a 31-minute women’s singles match.
Sindhu had beaten the Thai girl twice in the past but she was not third time lucky as the world number 13 set up a clash with Korea’s Ji Hyun Sung, who stunned seventh seed Chinese Yanjiao Jiang 21—10 21—17.
Saina dominated the nets and used her smashes to good use against Mingtian. The Indian slowly opened up a 3—1 lead in the first game and kept widening the gap to pocket the game.
The second game was no different as Saina once again moved to 6—2 early on and then stretched her lead by reeling off consecutive points at will to make a smooth entry into the quarterfinals.