Back-to-form Saina sails into China Open semis
World No.2 and defending champion Saina Nehwal cruised to victory against her Japanese counterpart Nozomi Okuhara from Japan in straight sets 21-16, 21-13 at the China Open Superseries Premier in Fuzhou, China.
The first game started with the players trading points to 2-2, after which Okuhara raked in three quick points to lead 5-2. At this point, the game seemed to head towards the Japanese's way as Saina was quick on the return but showed no initiative on the attack. Saina, however, quickly changed gears and rallied back to level the score with a scorching cross-court smash that left Okuhara sprawled. But the Japanese managed to keep up as both players committed marginal errors amid a heavy drift to reach 9-11 at the interval in favor of Saina. The Indian shuttler stuck to her game plan of going for Okuhara's back-hand with attacking shots and started to use the drift to her advantage. From here on, the Japanese posed no real threat as Saina wrapped it up at 21-16.
In the second game, the Olympic Bronze medallist dominated completely and showed no signs of the injury that had hampered her performance in the previous couple of tournaments. Saina managed to create an eight point cushion to lead 11-3 by the interval. Okuhara tried her best to come back into the game by winning a few quick points to reach 9-13. But Saina maintained her composure and made no further delay in comfortably ensuring a semi-final berth by winning the set 21-13 and closing out the match in 42 minutes. The Indian now leads 4-0 in head-to-head against Okuhara.
The Indian ace will next play her long time nemesis, Wang Yihan from the host nation in the semi-final tomorrow. Yihan reached the semi-final with a win over Tai T Y from Chinese Taipei in straight sets.