Saina, Sindhu advance to second round in Asia Championships

Olympic-bound Indian shuttlers, Saina Nehwal and PV Sindhu won their respective women’s singles matches to make a resounding start to their campaign at the Badminton Asia Championships here on Wednesday.

Fifth seed Saina disposed off Indonesia’s Fitriani Fitriani 21-16, 21-17, while Sindhu brushed aside another Indonesian Maria Febe Kusumastuti 21-10, 21-13 in a half an hour contest in the opening round here.

In the next round, World No. 8 Saina will face the winner of the match between Indonesia’s Lindaweni Fanetri and Thailand’s Nitchaon Jindapol, while ranked 10th Sindhu will meet eighth seed Tai Tzu Ying of Chinese Taipei.

However, it was a bad day at office for other Indians in the fray here, the last event before the Olympic qualification deadline. While Korean pair of Chang Ye Na and Lee So Hee defeated India’s Jwala Gutta and Ashwini Ponnappa 21-15, 21-11 in women’s doubles, men’s doubles combo of Manu Attri and B Sumeeth Reddy suffered a 15-21, 13-21 loss to fifth seeded Japanese pair of Hiroyuki Endo and Kenichi Hayakawa.

Another men’s doubles pair of Pranaav Jerry Chopra and Akshay Dewalkar also faced defeat, losing 19-21, 17-21 to Or Chin Chung and Tang Chun Man of Hong Kong.