Commonwealth Games 2014: Gutta/Ponappa sail into the finals; Gurusaidutt to play for bronze

Jwala Gutta and Ashwini Ponappa

Defending champions and former World Championships bronze medalists Jwala Gutta and Ashwini Ponnappa stormed into the finals of women’s doubles after crushing the Malaysian pair of Loo Yin Lim and Lai Pei Jing 21-7 21-12 in their badminton semifinal match at the Glasgow Commonwealth Games.

Third seeded and World No. 21 pair of Jwala and Ashwini, who routed the Sri Lankan pair of Achini Rathnasiri and Upuli Weerasinghe 21-10, 21-9 to enter the last four, needed just 25 minutes to get past the World No. 37 Malaysian duo.

Lim and Jing were absolutely no match for the Indian pair from the very start, as they lost the opening game in just 11 minutes. The story was more or less the same in the next game too as the result started looking like a foregone conclusion after the mid game interval.

The Indian pair have a tough task in the gold medal match though as they will face the World No. 18 Malaysian pair of Vivian Kah Mun Hoo and Khe Wei Woon, who thrashed the English pair of Gabrielle Adcock and Lauren Smith 21-16, 21-11 in the other semifinal.

It was a rather disapponting day for the World No. 34 Indian shuttler R.M.V. Gurusaidutt as he squandered a one-game advantage and lost his singles semifinal match 16-21, 21-19, 21-15 to World No. 40 Derek Wong of Singapore.

He will now take on the 26th-ranked English shuttler Rajiv Ouseph in the bronze medal play off.