Swiss Open: Sindhu, Srikanth, 2 others enter qtr, double delight for Satwik
Basel: Olympic silver medallist P V Sindhu and former champion Kidambi Srikanth advanced to the quarterfinals of the singles competition along with two other Indians at the Swiss Open badminton tournament here on Thursday.
While Sindhu and Srikanth had contrasting wins, Ajay Jayaram and last edition's runners-up B Sai Praneeth too dished out superlative performances to make it to the last-eight in the Super 300 event, the first tournament in the extended Olympic qualification period.
It was double delight for young Satwiksairaj Rankireddy also as he progressed to the quarterfinals in both the mixed doubles and men's doubles competitions with respective partners Ashwini Ponnappa and Chirag Shetty.
World champion Sindhu hardly broke any sweat, beating USA's Iris Wang 21-13 21-14 in women's singles, while former world number one Srikanth notched up a 21-10 14-21 21-14 victory over world number 50 Thomas Rouxel of France in their respective men's singles second round matches.
Jayaram eked out a hard-fought 21-18 17-21 21-13 against third seed Dane Rasmus Gemke.
Praneeth, an Olympic hopeful, later saw off Spain's Pablo Abian 21-12 21-17 to join others in last eight.
Satwik and Ashwini, who had reached the semifinals at Toyota Thailand Open Super 1000 in January, defeated the Indonesian combination of Rinov Rivaldy and Pitha Haningtyas Mentari 21-18 21-16 in a mixed doubles second-round match.
Satwik and Chirag, ranked 10th in the world, then dashed the challenge of Indonesia's Pramudya Kusumawardana and Yeremia Erich Yoche Yacob Rambitan 21-17 20-22 21-17 to also make it to the last eight.
While second seed Sindhu meets fifth seeded Thai Busanan Ongbamrungphan next, fourth seed Srikanth, who had won the title in 2015, faces sixth seeded Thai Kantaphon Wangcharoen.
Jayaram will be up against another Thai Kunlavut Vitidsarn, seeded eighth, and Praneeth will cross swords with second seed Lee Zii Jia of Malaysia in the last-eight stage.
Satwik and Ashwini will meet fifth-seeded Malaysians Tan Kian Meng and Lai Pei Jing, while Satwik and Chirag will also be up against another fifth seeded Malaysian combination of Ong Yew Sin and Teo Ee Yi.
Sourabh Verma had a rough day as he lost 17-21 14-21 to Vitidsarn to crash out of the men's singles event.
Ashwini Ponnappa and N Sikki Reddy too were ousted after losing 11-21 15-21 to Denmark's Amalie Magelund and Freja Ravn in the women's doubles second-round.
On Wednesday night, two-time former champion Saina Nehwal had bowed out of the tournament after a hard-fought first-round loss in the women's singles.
The London Olympic bronze-medallist battled for 58 minutes before going down 16-21 21-17 21-23 to Phittayaporn Chaiwan of Thailand.
Saina's husband and fellow shuttler Parupalli Kashyap too went down 15-21 10-21 to Pablo, while young Lakshya Sen lost 16-21 12-21 to Victor Svendsen in the men's singles first round.
Men's doubles pair of MR Arjun and Dhruv Kapila lost 16-21 18-21 to seventh seeds Vladimir Ivanov and Ivan Sozonov of Russia.
