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Day 2 Review of the BWF World Championships

By: Editor
Date: 21 Aug, 2019
Image Courtesy: IndianExpress
Prior to the BWF World Championships, both B Sai Praneeth & HS Pranoy have been in the news largely for the Arjuna Awards. One for winning it, and the other for having spoken up against the methodology adopted for selecting the winners. And yet on Tuesday, on Day 2 of the Total BWF World Championships at St. Jacobshalle in Basel, Switzerland both of them let their on-court exploits reverberate louder than all the other news.

HS Pranoy took down Lin Dan in a fascinating three-game contest, and now will face World No #1 Kento Momota for a place in the last eight. Having won the opening game relatively easy at 21-11, Pranoy surrendered the initiative right back to the former world & Olympic champion as he went down 13-21 in the second game. The third game was always going to be a nail biter with both players looking to go for the kill. 

Lin Dan & Pranoy matched evenly in the early exchanges as they were tied at 4-4 at one stage, and then Pranoy edging slightly ahead at 6-5. And this is where Pranoy made the match, a string of 8 consecutive points left Lin Dan way too much catching up to do and he just managed two more points for the rest of the game, as Pranoy took the match in the third game 21-7.

B Sai Praneeth, meanwhile, was up against South Korean challenger Lee Dong Keun, and despite the straight games victory, it was a closely fought contest all along. Lee held a slight advantage going into the first mid-game interval, leading 11-9, but once Sai grabbed the lead at 13-12, he stayed ahead right through to take the first game.

The second game followed a similar trajectory, but this time it was Sai Praneeth to hold the lead at the mid-game interval. And like de ja vu, it was Lee’s turn to put a string of four points together and tie the game at 11-apiece and then 12-apiece. The South Korean was happy to engage Sai in long rallies, while the Indian shuttler had an excellent day both from the net and from the back of the court. Some of the smashes from Sai, were just exquisite, kissing the lines and perfectly placed out of Lee’s reach. 

Lee Dong Keun didn’t really help his own cause with some really poor judgement on the Hawkeye calls, and exhausting his reviews mid-way through both games. Sai’s excellent all-round play combined with a few errors from Lee ensured that Sai won this hard-fought contest 21-16 21-15. 

In doubles action, India had a bit of a mixed bag with Sumeeth Reddy/Manu Attri winning their men’s doubles tie against French pair Thom Gicquel/Ronan Labar 21-13 21-13, while MR Arjun/Shlok Ramachandran combined to take down the swiss pair Tobias Kuenzi/Oliver Schaller 21-14 21-16. 

Arjun George/Sanyam Shukla were the first of the casualties for Team India, going down 18-21 11-21 to the Japanese pair of Takuto Inoue/Yuki Kaneko, while the women’s doubles pair of Pooja Dandu/Sanjana Santosh went down fighting to Hsu Ya Ching/Hu Ling Fang of Chinese Taipei 21-15 21-14.

Sikki Reddy/Ashwini Ponnappa, meanwhile, progressed into the next round of the women’s doubles courtesy a walkover by Chang Ching Hui/Yang Ching Tun. 

With PV Sindhu, Saina Nehwal, Kidambi Srikanth all in action on Day 3, its building up nicely for the Indian badminton fan!

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