India Open | PV Sindhu, Saina Nehwal seeded second and fifth respectively
PV Sindhu and Saina Nehwal have been seeded second and fifth respectively in the upcoming India Open. India also has a strong presence in the men’s section with as many as six shuttlers among whom Kidambi Srikanth has secured the top seed of number three followed by Sameer Varma at fifth.
The 12th edition of India Open with prize money of USD 350,000 will take place at the Siri Fort Complex in New Delhi. The All England Open Badminton Championship winner Chen Yufei of China will spearhead the women’s section with the top seed and she will be followed by 2017 champion PV Sindhu. The next Indian in the seeding is Saina Nehwal who has previously won two editions of the championship.
The world number six Sindhu will face another Indian shuttler Mugdha Agrey while Nehwal, set to return after being diagnosed with an intestinal infection, will face Chna’s Cai Yanyan in the first round fixtures.
Sindhu may face defending champion, American Beiwen Zhang in the semi-final, whereas the former world number one from Thailand Ratchanok Intanon will offer a tough test to Nehwal in the quarter-finals if both of them manage to progress past the opening rounds.
Vrushali Gummadi, Sai Uttejitha Rao are the other Indians in the main draw of women’s singles.
Coming to the men’s singles world number two Shi Yuqi from China takes the top billing. Apart from world number seven Kidambi Srikanth, Sameer Verma will also carry the hopes of the Indian team. The other Indians in the fray are Sai Praneeth, HS Prannoy, Parupalli Kashyap and Subhankar Dey.
Srikanth will take on Wong Wing Ki Vincent from Hong Kong, while Verma will face Danish shuttler Rasmus Gemke in the opening round.
Unfortunately, there are no top seeds in the women’s doubles. However, N Sikki Reddy and Ashwini Ponnappa, the Commonwealth Games bronze medallists, will look to pull off an upset over the sixth seeds Li Wenmei and Zheng Yu.
With respect to the men’s doubles, Kim Astrup and Anders Skaarup Rasmussen, the Danish pair take the top spot. The top-seeded Indian pair is Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty at three. The next best Indian seed is the pair of former national champions Manu Attri and Sumeeth Reddy
In the mixed doubles category, the top spot has been given to the Chinese pair of Wang Yilyu and Huang Dongping, the 2018 BWF World Tour Finals champions. Representing India, Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Ponnappa, the 2018 World Championships quarter-finalists are the eighth seeds in the mixed doubles draw. Pranaav Jerry Chopra and Sikki Reddy are unseeded and could possibly face the fourth seeds Hafiz Faizal and Gloria Emanuelle Widjaja, from Indonesia, in the second round.
The 2019 India Open is scheduled between March 26 and March 31 and India will be hopeful of clinching a few titles given their good presence in all categories.
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