Srikanth shocks Kashyap

A new crop of shuttlers made their presence felt at the ATS National Badminton Championships after defending champions in men’s and women’s singles -- Parupalli Kashyap and Sayali Gokhale -- bowed out in the semifinals on Sunday.

While 20-year-old K Srikanth took out Kashyap 21-14, 21-19, junior national champion Rituparna Das, 17, made everyone stand up and take notice with her 13-21, 21-13, 21-14 victory over two-time champion Sayali.

In the men’s singles finals on Monday, fifth-seeded Srikanth will take on second seed and a fellow trainee at Gopichand Academy, RMV Gurusaidutt, who pravialed over B Sai Praneeth 21-13, 21-19.

In the women’s singles, Rituparna faced the challenge of World No 10 and World Championships bronze medallist PV Sindhu. Sindhu had to work hard to carve out a 21-17, 21-14 victory over third-seeded Arundhati Pantawane.

The women’s doubles offers an exciting title clash between the top seeds Pradnya Gadre and N Sikki Reddy and the second-seeded combination of Jwala Gutta and Ashwini Ponnappa. The 2010 Commonwealth Games gold winning pair had lost to newly formed tandem of Gadre and Sikki in the recently concluded Tata Open in Mumbai and would be eager to prove a point.

In men’s doubles, top seeds Pranaav Jerry Chopra and Akshay Dewalkar will meet second seeds Manu Atti and Sumeeth Reddy B.

The day witnessed some quality contests. Srikanth showed stomach for a fight by first dousing a spirited challenge from fourth-seeded Anand Pawar for a 18-21, 21-14, 21-13 victory in the quarterfinals, lasting 55 minutes. He had an even tougher opponent in Kashyap, who had beaten him at the same stage in the previous edition at Srinagar.

But Kashyap, after seeing off a strong challenge from seventh-seeded HS Prannoy in the morning, didn’t look in the best of shape. Srikanth made his job tougher with ruthless smashes and good reflexes at the net. Srikanth, after pocketing the first game with ease, took a 5-1 lead in the second game before Kashyap caught up with him at 12-12 through some good net play and even led 18-16 at one point. But Srikanth shot back to level the scores and reached the match point with a well-placed half-smash. He sealed the match with a backhand winner to enter his maiden final.

DH News Service

Results (all semifinals):  Men’s singles: 5-K Srikanth bt P Kashyap 21-14, 21-19, 2-Gurusaidutt RMV bt 6-Sai Praneeth 21-13, 2-19. Doubles: 1-Pranaav Jerry Chopra/ Akshay Dewalkar bt Rupesh Kumar/ Sanave Thomas 19-21, 21-14, 21-18; 2-Manu Attri/ Sumeeth Reddy bt 3-Alwin Francis/ Arun Vishnu 18-21, 23-21, 21-18. Women’s singles: 2-PV Sindhu bt 3-Arundhati Pantawane 21-17, 21-14; 15-Rituparna Das bt 7-Sayali Gokhale 13-21, 21-13, 21-14. Doubles: 2-Jwala Gutta/ Ashwini Ponnappa bt 5-Prajakta Sawant/ Aarti Sara Sunil 21-8, 21-15; 1-Pradnya Gadre/ Siki Reddy bt 3-Aparna Balan/ PV Sindhu 21-16, 21-18 Mixed doubles: 1-Tarun Kona/ Ashwini Ponnappa bt 3-Nanda Gopal K/ Siki Reddy N 21-15, 21-14; 2-Arun Vishnu/ Aparna Balan bt Chirag Sen/ Kuhoo Garg 21-9, 21-11.