India Open: Saina faces Yip challenge

Saina Nehwal

Indian badminton star Saina Nehwal takes on a familiar foe in the first round of her home India Open beginning April 24. Nehwal, who has surprisingly never done well in the India Open, will be keen to set the record straight as she takes on Yip Pui Yin of Hong Kong.

Yip, a former Asian Games silver medallist, is ranked No.18. She has played quite inconsistently in recent times. Her last encounter with Saina was in the second round of the World Championships, which she conceded after trailing 21-3 13-5. Yip, who won silver at the 2006 Asian Games after a brilliant run in which she dumped two Chinese greats in Xie Xingfang and Zhang Ning, has since then lost her belligerence as a hard attacking player. Saina should be able to get past her without much trouble, and she holds a 3-1 career record over the Hong Kong player. Incidentally, Yip’s last good show was at the India Open last year, when she reached the semifinals before falling to eventual winner Porntip of Thailand.

The Indian world No.5 has a good draw, and is expected to take on Tine Baun of Denmark in the third round. World No.3 Wang Shixian, who lost to Saina at the Swiss Open recently, is top seeded and in Saina’s half of the draw. The other Chinese contenders are world No.4 Li Xuerui and world No.6 Jiang Yanjiao, both in the bottom half. It will be a tough task for Saina to pull off a title victory on home turf, but if she does, it will be one of her career’s finest moments.

Saina’s compatriot PV Sindhu faces the talented Taipei girl Tai Tzu Ying, who had beaten Saina at the Denmark Open. Apart from Sindhu and Saina, there are a clutch of Indians in the qualifying rounds.

Meanwhile, the two top-ranked Indians, Ajay Jayaram and P Kashyap, are in a neck-and-neck battle for the lone Olympic spot. Jayaram is pitted against England champion Rajiv Ouseph, while Kashyap takes on Pablo Abian of Spain – neither is an easy match. Fans will be thrilled to see two legends in action – top seeded Lee Chong Wei, and second seeded Peter Gade. Others in the draw include third seed Chen Jin, Taufik Hidayat and Jan O Jorgensen.

India’s doubles pairs, who too are in a race for last-minute qualification to the Olympics, have some challenging matches. Rupesh Kumar and Sanave Thomas face Korean greats Yong Dae/ Jae Sung, and will go in without hoping too much, while Jwala Gutta/ Ashwini Ponnappa can breathe slightly easy as they’re against Hong Kong’s Lok Yan Poon/ Ying Suet Tse. In the mixed, however, it gets far tougher for Jwala as she and Diju face a Chinese pair upfront – Tao Jiaming/ Xia Huan.

With a number of top-class players in action, this will be a festival of badminton. Don’t miss the action!