| Kashyap joins Saina in knockout stage |
LONDON Indian male shuttler Parupalli Kashyap on Tuesday scored a dominating straight games win over Vietnam’s Tien Minh Nguyen to join compatriot Saina Nehwal in the knock-out stage of singles competition in the Olympics on Tuesday.
The 21st ranked Kashyap outplayed his rival, ranked 11 places above him, 21-9 21-14 in the second and final Group D match of the men’s singles event. By virtue of the win, Kashyap finished on top of Group D, having beaten Belgium’s Tan Yuhan in an earlier game.
Saina, ranked fifth in the world, too had little difficulty in disposing off the challenge of Belgium’s Lianne Tan 21-4 21-14 in a Group E women’s singles match Monday night.
Against his higher ranked opponent, Kashyap played aggressively right from the word go and never let the Vietnamese shuttler settle down. Kashyap set up the points beautifully by opening the court and executed the winners with ease.
In all the Indian took 35 minutes to down his opponent and move to the next stage. The match featured long rallies with both the players playing some fierce flat shots, but it was the Indian who scored points consistently. Minh tried to claw his way back in the second game but Kasyhap never let the momentum slip and clinched the issue with a cross-court smash to the left of his rival.
As expected Kashyap was delighted with the easy win but rued that his father could not be there to see him dominate the match.
“I expected to win but not that easily. Not that it was an easy game - we had some long rallies and when he gets into his rhythm he can be very dangerous.” Kashyap said.
Press Trust of India
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