PANJIM: Women’s singles second seed Malvika Bansod of Maharashtra and third seed Ashmita Chaliha of Assam were knocked out while top seed Aakarshi Kashayap of Chhattisgarh had to save five match points to survive in the first round of the individual badminton events at the 37th National Games at the Dr Shyama Prasad Mukherjee Indoor Stadium, Taleigao Plateau, on Sunday.
Gujarat’s Adita Rao packed off Bansod 21-15, 21-14 while Chaliha retired against Telangana’s M Meghana Reddy while trailing 19-21, 17-17 in the second game.
Kashyap was lucky that Goa’s Anura Prabudesai failed to convert any of the five match points in the second game while battling a hamstring pull and had to eventually retire with the score reading 19-21, 25-23, 13-7 in the top seed’s favour.
There were no such problems for the seeded players in men’s singles as all of them sailed through without breaking much sweat. Only top seed Kiran George of Kerala was pushed to the third game by K Jagadeesh of Andhra Pradesh but managed to advance 21-19, 19-21, 21-11. Rao will now face Uttarakhand’s Aditi Bhatt for a place in the semi-finals. Bhat defeated Haryana’s Ira Sharma 21-18, 21-23, 21-16 in the other first round match.
Earlier, local hope Prabhudesai played her heart out against world No. 38 Kashyap and was left ruing her inability to convert at least one of the five match points she earned during her 54-minute first round match.
“I was feeling my hamstring even before the start of the match since I had played four matches in the team events as well. But I decided to push myself and it would have been fantastic if I could have converted any of the match points in the second game,” Prabhudesai said after the match.
Kashyap will now take on Maharashtra’s Shruti Mundada in the quarter-finals. In the net ball competition that started on Sunday, defending champion Haryana defeated Maharashtra 63-48 in their Group A clash while Jammu and Kashmir scrapped past host Goa 52-50.
