Manu-Sumeeth losses, India's campaign in doubles ends

The men's doubles pair of Manu Attri and B Sumeeth Reddy suffered a straight game loss to China's Chai Biao and Hong Wei in the second match of Group D to draw curtains on India's badminton doubles campaign at the Rio Olympics here today.

Playing in their first Olympics, the World No. 21 lost 13-21 15-21 to Biao and Wei, ranked fifth in the world in a 35-minute battle.

Manu and Sumeeth, who had lost to Indonesian pair of Mohammad Ahsan and Hendra Setiawan yesterday in their opening Group D match, will next take on Japan's Hiroyuki Endo and Kenichi Hayakawa, ranked 8th in the world.

The Japanese combo has already sealed its place in the knockout stage after winning both their matches. The winner of the match between Indonesian and Chinese pair tomorrow will qualify for the knockout.

Earlier, the experienced pair of Jwala Gutta and Ashwini Ponnappa were eliminated from women's doubles event after losing their second successive group A clash.

In a rollercoaster game against the Dutch team of Eefje Muskens and Selena Piek, Jwala and Ashwini went down 16-21 21-16 17-21 in a 48-minute clash.

Lying second from bottom in the group standings, Jwala and Ashwini will have just pride to play for when they take on Puttita Supajirakul and Sapsiree Taerattanachai of Indonesia in their final group clash.

The Indonesians are also winless and are lying bottom of the heap.

In men's doubles, the Indian pair fought hard from the start but failed to tame the Chinese who managed to hold a eight-point game advantage and pocketed the opening game after Manu hit long.

In the second game, Manu and Sumeeth started on a positive note and marched ahead to a 3-0 lead but Biao and Wei came back to enter the break with a slender 11-9 lead.

After the interval, the Chinese continued to move ahead and opened up a 17-12 lead at one stage. Manu and Sumeeth tried to bridge the gap but they soon reached match point at 20-15 and sealed the issue when Sumeeth hit the net.

Jwala and Ashwini, who were distinctly uncoordinated in their opening loss to Japan, gave a better account of themselves in today's match but failed to go for the kill.

The opening game was lost in merely 19 minutes but far from being bogged down, Jwala and Ashwini fought back to grab the second with the former being particularly impressive with her strokeplay close to the net.

However, the momentum gained in that game could not take them past the finishing line as Muskens and Piek bounced back to clinch the match.

Ashwini proved to be the weak link in the decider and Muskens and Piek did not miss any opportunity to attack her on the back court.