New Delhi, July 29: A victory in the women's doubles was the only silver lining on a dismal opening day for Indian shuttlers as both their men's singles players and one men's doubles pair bowed out of the World Badminton Championships in Birmingham.
In the men's singles, national champion Abhinn Shyam Gupta was trounced by third seed Taufik Hidayat of Indonesia 15-7 15-5 while another top player Nikhil Kanetkar went down fighting to 1997 world champion Peter Rasmussen of Denmark 4-15 15-9 5-15 yesterday, according to information received here. The women's pair of Jwalla Gutta and Shruti Kurian gave the Indian contingent something to cheer about as they defeated the Swedish pair of Johanna Persson and Elin Bergblom 17-16 15-6 in just over an hour. They now face 16th seed Wen-Hsing Cheng and Yu-Chin Chien of Chinese Taipei. Kanetkar was straightaway forced on the back foot by Rasmussen as the Indian took time to find his feet in his maiden appearance at the big event. After losing the first game tamely, Kanetkar switched to a more attacking style in the second game as he overpowered the Dane to win the game 15-9.

But in the decider, the Indian south-paw seemed to have run out of steam as he could not match Rasmussen's speed losing the match in an hour's time.

In the other tie, Gupta proved no match to Hidayat, last edition's bronze medal winner, as he surrendered tamely in just 41 minutes.

In the men's doubles, Jaseel P Ismail and Jaison Xavier lost to ninth seeds Keita Masuda and Tadashi Ohtsuka of Japan 7-15 5-15 in just 28 minutes.

Bureau Report