Gurusaidutt enters Bulgarian badminton final
Fit-again RMV Gurusaidutt led a strong Indian performance in the Bulgarian International Challenge badminton in Sofia. The third seed moved into the men’s singles final after upstaging Indonesian top seed Andre Kurniawan Tedjono 22-20, 21-16 in 52 minutes.
Top-seeded Manu Attri and B Sumeeth Reddy also moved into the men’s doubles final after defeating British third seeds Andrew Ellis and Peter Mills 21-14, 21-14 in 37 minutes.
Meanwhile, Sameer Verma went down to Spanish fourth seed Pablo Abian 19-21, 21-16, 11-21 in the semifinals in an hour, after having shocked Israeli second seed Misha Zilberman 12-21, 25-23, 21-7 in the quarterfinals.
Ruthvika Shivani lost to seventh seeded Ukrainian Maria Ulitina 20-22, 15-21 in 42 minutes in the semifinals on a day when both the quarterfinals and semifinals were played back-to-back across categories.
In mixed doubles, fourth-seeded Tarun Kona and Sikki Reddy lost in the semifinals to the Polish pair of Robert Mateusiak and Nadiezda Zieba 9-21, 11-21in 30 minutes.
Gurusaidutt is hopeful of regaining his top-25 place after having recovered from his injury. The 25-year-old had earlier beaten fifth seed Vladimir Malkov of Russia.
