Thailand Open: Verma stages gritty comeback
NEW DELHI: Sameer Verma comes across as a very shy person. Even after his greatest of victories, the 26-year-old has always maintained his calm demeanour. Tuesday was no different as the Pullela Gopichand protégé staged possibly the most incredible comeback of his career, saving seven match points to outsmart Lee Zii Jia 18-21, 27-25, 21-19 in a marathon first round that lasted an hour and 14 minutes on the opening day of the Toyota Thailand Open.
Down 18-21, 6-17 it looked all but over for Sameer, but the gritty shuttler from Dhar, Madhya Pradesh kept the bird in play to first close the gap and then push the match into the decider by claiming his first game point.
After losing the second game in that fashion, the demoralised eighth seeded Malaysian never found his rhythm in the third game. Sameer, on the other hand, found his game and confidence and never relinquished his lead again to enter the second round of the $1 million Super 1000 tournament. “I was not mentally prepared for this tournament,” said Sameer, who bettered his record to 2-4 against world No.10 Lee. “In the second game my ankle was hurting a bit. I was down during the interval of the second game, and my coach told me to focus on playing my own style.”
The Indian will next face Danish world No.17 Rasmus Gemke, who progressed after Parupalli Kashyap retired while trailing 0-3 in the first game.
It was a positive day for reigning world champion PV Sindhu who overcame local player Busanan Ongbamrungphan—who had beaten Saina Nehwal in the second round last week—21-17, 21-13 in 43 minutes. “It was a good game and I’m very happy. This win was very important for me in this tournament because last week, I went out in the first round,” said Sindhu, who next takes on Malaysian Kisona Selvaduray.
However, former world No.1 Saina Nehwal went down to former world champion Ratchanok Intanon 21-17, 21-8.
Meanwhile, world championship medallist B Sai Praneeth tested positive for Covid-19 , forcing him out of the tournament. Kidambi Srikanth too had to withdraw as he was sharing the hotel room with Sai despite progressing to Round 2 after beating Thai Sitthikom Thammasin 21-11, 21-11.