China Open Super Series 2008: Arvind Bhat in QFs; Round 1 exits for Chetan and Saina
India’s top badminton players Chetan Anand and Saina Nehwal made first round exits at the China Open Super Series on Wednesday, November 19, 2008. Chetan Anand (WR #14) lost to Malaysia’s Choong Hann Wong (WR #15) 10-21, 14-21 in his first round match. The manner in which Chetan lost is disappointing especially after his ascendancy in the world rankings and he will be looking to make amends in the upcoming Hong Kong Super Series (November 24-30, 2008). In the women’s singles, Saina Nehwal (WR #11) lost to China’s Lin Zhu (WR #5) in a 52-min thriller 6-21 21-12 19-21. This is a credible performance by Saina considering the home-crowd advantage held by her Chinese opponent.
The silver lining for India at the China Open Super Series has come in the form of Arvind Bhat (WR #41), who has had a favourable draw in the tournament. In his first round match on Wednesday, he made short work of Malaysia’s Wee Chung Pei (WR #131) 21-9 21-13. In his second round match, he fought back to win against Czech Republic’s Petr Koukal (WR #40) 18-21 21-18 21-15 in 62-min. Arvind Bhat stands a great chance of making the semi-finals as he takes on WR #170 Kai Wen of China in the quarter-finals on Friday.
Meanwhile, the women’s doubles pair of Saina Nehwal and Anna Rice of Canada lost their second round match to the 4th seeded Korean pair of Jung Eun Ha and Min Jung Kim 13-21 11-21.
[...] Mixed day for India Tagged with: anand pawar, arvind bhat, Bank of Scotland International Badminton Championships, China Open Super Series 2008, indian badminton Posted by yash on Saturday, November 22, 2008, 13:05 This news item was posted in Badminton category and has 0 Comments so far. It was a mixed day for India on the badminton courts. World number 41, India’s Arvind Bhat lost his quarterfinal match to Chinese qualifier Kai Wen 21-13 21-10 in just 28 minutes at the Li Ning China Open Super Series. Arvind joins the list of surprise Kai Wen casualties at the event. Kai got the better of Dane World Number 8 and sixth seed Joachim Persson in the round of 16. Arvind loss caps off what has been a rather disappointing event for the India. Mens world number 14 Chetan Anand and womens world number 11 Saina Nehwal both lost their 1st round encounters earlier in the week. [...]