Jayaram, Bhat enter 3rd round; all other Indians lose

Auckland: Ajay Jayaram and Arvind Bhat were the only bright spots on an otherwise disappointing day for the Indian shuttlers at the New Zealand Badminton Open on Thursday.

While Jayaram beat Marius Myhre of Norway 24-22 21-5, Bhat, seeded 13th, outplayed compatriot Kirtesh Dhindhwal 21-16 21-12 to enter the third round of the men`s singles event. But all other Indians - Anand Pawar, R M V Gurusaidutt, Chetan Anand - lost their respective men`s singles second round matches to crash out of the tournament. In the women`s singles also, the lone Indian representative, Sarada Jasti went down fighting 21-18 17-21 17-21 to a qualifier, Vicki Copeland in the opening round. Third seeded Jayaram took 26 minutes to get the better of his opponent from Norway. He will next face 12th seed Ji Hoon Hing of South Korea. Bhat had an easy outing against qualifier Dhindhwal, who he beat in just 23 minutes. Bhat will take on sixth seed Andre Kurniawan Tedjono in the next round. It was an off day for Pawar but Chetan and Gurusaidutt fought hard before losing their respective ties. Pawar, fifth seed, was thrashed by unseeded Chia-Hsin Wan of Chinese Taipei 16-21 14-21 in 36 minutes. Fourteenth seed Chetan conceded the first game advantage to go down 21-17 17-21 12-21 to Parinyawat Thongnuam of Thailand in a match that lasted 56 minutes. Gurusaidautt, seeded fourth, after losing the first game, came back strongly to win the second, but, failed to keep the momentum going to lose 18-21 21-13 19-21 to unseeded Malaysian Beryno Jiann Tze Wong, in a little less than an hour. PTI