SAINA WINS IN MACAU OPEN
MACAU: Top seed Saina Nehwal rallied to register another narrow victory over Indonesia’s Dinar Dyah Ayustine to reach the quarter-finals of the Macau Open Grand Prix Gold badminton tournament here on Thursday.
Former World No. 1 Saina bounced back from a game down to see off Ayustine 17-21, 21-18, 21-12 in a match which lasted over an hour in the women’s singles competition here.
London Olympics bronze medallist, Saina will next take on China’s Zhang Yiman.
However, it was curtains for P Kashyap and men’s doubles pair of Manu Attri and B Sumeeth Reddy. Kashyap, who is on a comeback trail, put up a gallant fight before losing 13-21, 20-22 to Lin Yu Hsien of Chinese Taipei in a 45-minute duel.third seeds Manu and Sumeeth also fought hard before going down 20-22, 19-21 to Singapore’s Danny Bawa Chrisnanta and Hendra Wijaya.
In the women’s singles match, Saina blew a 11-7 lead in the opening game to see Ayustine move ahead and pocket the game. However, a determined Saina dished out a more dominating performance in the second game as she zoomed to a 11-3 lead at the break.
Ayustine slowly and steadily bridged the gap after interval and drew parity at 18-18 but the Indian ensured there was no hiccup as she bounced back into the contest.
In the decider, it was the Indonesian shuttler who held a slender 4-2 lead early on but Saina turned the tables at 5-5 and moved ahead, opening up a 11-8 lead at the interval.
Saina then reeled off four points to extend the lead and eventually sealed the match with another fourpoint burst.