New Delhi: Saina Nehwal and Kidambi Srikanth rounded up a brilliant Sunday for Indian badminton winning their respective $275,000 India Open Superseries titles at the Siri Fort Sports Complex here.
Women’s singles top seed Saina Nehwal trumped former World Champion Ratchanok Intanon in the final to win 21-16, 21-14 in 49 minutes. Later, 22-year-old Srikanth had a contrasting victory but made sure that he made it a double for Indian badminton by defeating Danish World No.6 Viktor Axelsen 18-21, 21-13, 21-12 in 55 minutes.
With the victory, Saina took a 6-3 lead in career meetings over the World No.8, who won here in 2013. This is the Hyderabadi’s second title of the year after winning the India Grand Prix Gold in January in Lucknow. She had also reached the All England final earlier this month where she lost to reigning World Champion Carolina Marin of Spain.
The 25-year-old Indian was super confident while taking her shots against her Thai opponent, making the third seed run helter-skelter on the court and forcing her to commit errors.
Saina, currently ranked World No.2, sealed the deal on her first matchpoint to close a brilliant week when she also assured herself of the World No.1 spot when the Badminton World Federation (BWF) revises its rankings on Thursday. Later, World No.4 Srikanth did not start well in his men’s singles final against the sixth seed, losing the first game to the Dane.
This is second seed Srikanth’s second win over Axelsen in as many meetings after beating the Dane in the Swiss Open Grand Prix Gold final earlier this month. Both Saina and Srikanth took home $20,625 each for the title wins.
Bureau Report
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