New Delhi: Saurabh Verma and the mixed doubles pair of Ashwini Ponnappa-Joachim Fischer Nielsen helped Pune Pistons to victory over Krrish Delhi Smashers in the opening tie of the Indian Badminton League here on Wednesday at the Siri Fort Sports Complex.
Pune with this win bagged four points including a bonus, while Delhi claimed two points for their two wins.
After Pune's Saurabh Verma leveled 2-2 in the fourth match, which left the final and fifth match to be the decider. Then it was Pune's mixed pair of Ponnappa and Nielsen defeated Delhi's duo of Jwala Gutta and Koo Kien Keat 21-19, 16-21, 11-3 in a thriller.
Earlier, Sai Praneeth gave Delhi a winning start in the opening tie of men's singles against Pune's Tien Minh Nyugen, beating 21-16, 21-20. At the start of the first game, Praneeth raced to 11-6 before Nyugen bounced back to go ahead 14-13. But Praneeth kept his cool and exhibited excellent net play to clinch the game 21-16.
However, in the second game Nyugen was expected to come back hard at Praneeth and he did so with the game going neck and neck. But the Vietnamese shuttler made few unforced errors which allowed Praneeth to lead by 20-19. Praneeth was on match-point and had he not slipped while going for a smash at the net he would have sealed the game. But eventually he did win the first men's singles clash 21-16, 21-20.
In the second match of the evening, Juliane Schenk of Germany helped the visitors to bounce back with a 21-15, 21-6 win over Delhi's Nichaon Jindapon to level 1-1. The Thai youngster did put up some fight in the first game but in the second game she was completely routed by Schenk.
Both the teams wanted to take the lead in the third match, which was the men's doubles. The Delhi duo of Tan Boon Hoeng and Koo Kien Keat gave their team a 2-1 lead by beating Pune's Rupesh Kumar and Sanave Thomas 21-13, 21-16.
But it was Saurabh Verma in the second men's singles and the fourth match turned the tide again in Pune's favour by leveling it 2-2. Saurabh defeated HS Prannoy of Delhi 21-16, 19-21, 11-5.
Saurabh attacked from the start though Prannoy looked threatening with his booming smashes. At the first interval of the first game, Saurabh was leading 14-12 and hardly took any time to win it 21-16. However, in the second game Prannoy made a good comeback and took advantage of the errors made by Saurabh to take it 21-19.
In the decider third game and according to the rules of the league - the player who reaches to 11 points wins the match. Saurabh just raced away to 6-0 before Prannoy put up some fight to go down 11-5.
Results: Sai Praneeth (Smashers) beat Tien Minh Nguyen (Pistons) 21-16, 21-20; Juliane Schenk (Pistons) beat Jindapon Nichaon (Smashers) 21-15, 21-6; Boon Hoeng Tan/Kien Keat Koo (Smashers) beat Rupesh Kumar/Sanave Thomas (Pistons) 21-13, 21-16; Sourabh Verma (Pistons) beat HS Prannoy Verma (Smashers) 21-16, 19-21, 11-5; Ashwini Ponnappa/Joachim Fischer Nielsen (Pistons) beat Jwala Gutta/Keat Kien Koo (Smashers) 21-16, 16-21, 11-3.
Comments
0 comment