Hogwired All about sports Saina Nehwal has made to the quarter-finals of the Hong Kong Open Badminton after defeating Japanese shuttler Sato, in a three-round encounter, that lasted 51 minutes. Nehwal was able to maintain her dominance in the match right from the beginning and the same is quite prominent in the result. The final scoreline of the two shuttlers were 21-18, 9-21 and 21-16.
Picture Courtesy: Famous PeopleSaina Nehwal, who started off with a win in the first round, faced tough competition in the second round and thus did loose it to the Japanese star shuttler. However, Saina was quick enough to learn from her mistakes and this helped her win the third and final round, and thus established her supremacy over the Japanese shuttler yet again. The two stars have a head-to-head win-loss statistics as 6-1, in favour of Nehwal.
The previous world number 1, once again seems to be in her element in the match and it seemed that she had got her form back. Earlier in the tournament, Sania had faced Porntip Buranaprasertsuk, with whom she tussled a win, even after having lost the very first round.
Apart from Sania, the other shuttlers are also doing quite well and all of them, other than HS Prannoy, has been able to proceed to the next stages of the tournament. While Ajay Jayaram won a striking match against China’s Huang Yuxiang, Sameer Verma too confirmed his place in the next berth, after having defeated the Japanese qualifier, Sakai Kazumasa.
PV Sindhu who is having a great form has also ascended to the quarters. However, it would now interesting to see if the two Indian shuttle stars, Saina Nehwal and PV Sindhu would bump into each other if they would ascend to the semi-finals. Since Saina is in the lower half of the tournament, it is probable that the two Indian superstars would clash with each other in the semis, if they would be able to reach the semis.
