Kashyap, Nandagopal-Alwin, Sameer into Quarters at Orleans Masters 2018

Top seeded Sameer Verma and fifth seeded Parupalli Kashyap advanced to quarters at the BWF Tour Super 100 tournament, Orleans Masters 2018, in their respective men’s singles matches.

While, the sixth seeded men’s doubles pair Nandagopal Kidambi and Alwin Francis survived the scare by losing in the first game and progressed into next round at the USD 75,000 event on Thursday.

Sameer, initially trailed in the first game, slowly picked up the pace at 5-6 to his opponent Thomas Rouxel’s advantage. After the breather, Sameer gained three consecutive points to reduce the deficit to 10-11, and soon surpassed the Frenchman with six straight points to make the score 18-14 and took the game with 21-16.

In the second game, Sameer surged with the dominance since the beginning and slowly increased the gap to secure his berth in the quarter finals with 21-15.

Previously in another men’s singles event, Kashyap had an easy-peasy game against Joshua Magee of Ireland. The 42-ranked Kashyap ousted his opponent with 21-11, 21-14 in the 32-minute encounter.

Nandagopal and Alwin Francis took 54 minutes to defeat Milosz Bochat and Adam Cwalina of Poland with 15-21, 21-17, 21-17. The Indian duo had close fight in second two games and managed to seal the match.

The 28-year-old Gurusaidutt couldn’t get through the pre-quarters against the Dane Jan O Jorgensen in the 56-minute men’s singles event with 20-22, 21-17, 17-21.

While, the sole female contender from India to have reached pre-quarters at the tournament, got thrashed in 23 minutes with 11-21, 9-21 against Gregoria Mariska Tunjung of Indonesia.