Shreyansh shocks holder Sourabh

Defending champion Sourabh Verma on Sunday became a second-round casualty but for the rest of the top shuttlers it was just another day in office as they expectedly reached the third round of the 77th Senior National badminton championships.

Sourabh, who got a first-round bye, was defeated 21-18, 17-21, 15-21 by a hitherto unknown Shreyansh Jaiswal from Chattisgarh in the men’s singles competition at the Sher-e-Kashmir Indoor complex.

London Olympics quarterfinalist P Kashyap, Ajay Jayaram, Sai Praneeth, Anand Pawar, Arvind Bhat, Chetan Anand and Anup Sridhar also reached the third round in men’s singles event among others.

Defending champion in women’s singles, P V Sindhu, advanced to the third round after winning 21-10, 21-3 against Juhi Dewangan.
Arundhati Pantawane, Neha Pandit, Mohita Sahdev, Tanvi Lad (9), Trupti Murgunde, PC Thulasi and Sayali Gokhale also reached the next stage in women’s singles.

World number 33 Sourabh, who played for Petroleum Sports Promotion Board in the team event, was leading the match after winning the first game but 17-year-old Jaiswal raised his game to create pressure on his fancied rival.

The 19-year-old Sourabh crumbled under pressure to allow Shreyansh to come back into the match.

Despite losing the opening game, Shreyansh grew in confidence and went into the break at 11-10.

Sourabh tried to get his act together but ended up making too many unforced errors as his younger opponent walked away with the match in the end.
Shreyansh will next take on Nikhilesh Sarma in the third round.

“I’ve never played him before. He is the defending champion and when I went into the match, I thought I will lose. But then in the second game, I started retrieving everything and it put pressure on him.

“I slowly grew in confidence and I am extremely happy with my effort,” said Shreyansh, who has been training under Dronacharya Awardee coach Mohammad Arif for the last five years in Hyderabad.

Sourabh said he could not execute his strategy in the match. “I won the first game but in the second, I was in two minds with my strokes. I was confused what strokes to play and ended up making too many errors.”