Gurusaidutt, Srikanth in semis of Macau Open

Macau, Nov 30 (IANS) Indian shuttlers R.M.V. Gurusaidutt and K. Srikanth reached the men’s singles semi-finals of the Macau Open Grand Prix Gold here Friday by winning their respective matches.

Twelfth seed Gurusaidutt eased past Yan Kit Chan of Hong Kong 21-11, 21-14 in 34 minutes at the Macau Forum, equalling their head-to-head to two-all.

The World No.51 Indian, who reached a career high ranking of 37 earlier in February, cashed in on his attacking smashes over his opponent.

After being completely dominated in the first game, Chan tried fighting back in the second. However, with the score reading 16-14 in the favour of the Indian, Gurusaidutt took the last five points in a jiffy to fix a date against Chinese World No.65 Yuekun Chen, who beat the Indian in the only meeting they have had in 2010, Saturday.

K. Srikanth on the other hand had a tough battle against Nan Wei of Hong Kong which the Indian won 16-21, 21-19, 21-19 in one hour and two minutes in their first ever encounter.

After battling hard till 15-all, the World No. 90 Wei took the first game away.

The second and third games were again neck-and-neck fights with both games reaching 19-all. The World No. 109 Indian, who has jumped more than 200 places in the rankings since the beginning of the season, clinched the final two points in both games to enter the last four of one of the final tier three tournaments of the calendar.

Doubles specialist Ashwini Ponnappa lost both her mixed and women’s doubles quarterfinal matches.

In mixed doubles action, top seeds Tontowi Ahmad and Liliyana Natsir of Indonesia beat Tarun Kona and Ashwini 21-9, 21-13 in 22 minutes. While Ashwini and Pradnya Gadre lost 16-21, 21-12, 15-21 in 46 minutes to Komala Dewi and Jenna Gozali of Indonesia.

IANS 2012-11-30 19:22:33