Kowloon: Ace Indian shuttlers PV Sindhu, Saina Nehwal and HS Prannoy got off to winning starts and successfully made it to the second round of the Hong Kong Super Series on Wednesday.
Saina Nehwal, who won the national championship some time back encountered a tough challenge from Denmark’s Mette Poulsen but ended up getting the better of the world no. 44 Mette Poulsen in a match that lasted for 46 minutes.
The World Championship bronze medalist, who is also the world no. 11 would next face the eighth seeded China’s Chen Yufei. On the other hand, Olympic silver medalist PV Sindhu defeated Hong Kong’s own Leung Yuet Yee 21-18, 21-10 to ensure a match against Aya Ohori of Japan.
HS Prannoy, who was crowned the national champion some time ago had to dig deep against Hong Kong’s Hu Yun to eventually beat him 19-21, 21-17, 21-15. He would now go up against Kazumasa Sakai of Japan who had defeated him in the semis of the Indonesian Open Super Series.
But Parupalli Kashyap couldn’t capitalise after winning the opening game as he failed to beat Lee Dong Keun of Korea 21-15, 9-21, 20-22. Sourabh Verma was completely dominated by Tommy Sugiarto of Indonesia who won the contest 15-21, 8-21.
B Sai Praneeth also failed to make it past the opening round as he was outplayed by second seeded Korean Son Wan Ho 8-21, 16-21.
In the women’s doubles event, N Sikki Reddy and Ashwini Ponappa put up an inspired show against the Chinese duo of Huang Dongping and Le Wenmei but ended up on the losing side after having given a tough fight. They lost 11-21, 21-19, 19-21.
The men’s doubles team of B Sumeeth Reddy and Manu Attri was completely outplayed in straight sets- 17-21, 17-21 by the team of Malaysian Khim Wah Lim and Yoo Yeon Seong of Korea in the first round.