London: Star shuttler Saina Nehwal lit up another gloomy day for India at the Olympic Games by storming her way into the women’s singles semi-finals while shooting medal hope Ronjan Sodhi fell by the wayside here on Thursday.
Hyderabad’s Saina exhibited excellent courtcraft and unflinching attitude to defeat senior rival and two-time All England champion Tine Baun of Denmark 21-15 22-20 in a pulsating quarter-final clash that lasted 37 minutes.
Saina, thus, became the first-ever badminton player from the country to reach the last four stage in the quadrennial sports spectacle since 1992 when the shuttle game was introduced as a medal sport.
In 2008 at Beijing, the 22-year-old player had created history by becoming the first shuttler from India to reach the quarter-finals.
The world No 5 Indian had to toil hard against the two-time All England Champion Tine, who matched her strokes but was a tad erratic, which proved to be her bane in the quarterfinal match.
Saina was very precise with her strokes, while Tine was erratic initially and it allowed the Indian to lead 11-7 at the break.
After the breather, Saina slowly mixed her strokes to move into the game point at 20-12 with a short smash but she committed some unforced errors and a few judgemental mistakes on her part allowed the Dane to save three game points. Saina finally pocketed the first game with a smash which Tine netted.
In the second game, Tine opened up a slender 3-0 lead and extended it to 10-7 but Saina reeled off four straight points to lead 11-10 at the break once again.
Saina tried to exploit the length of the court and started combining lifts and clears with drops and net-shots but Tine was up for the job as she caught up with Saina at 15-15 and even managed to earn three game points at 20-17.
But Super Saina was not the one to take it lying low as she executed a cross court smash to move to 18-20.
She also pocketed the next point when her stroke was judged ‘in’ by the line-umpire, much to chagrin of Tine, who thought it was out and was celebrating her comeback by pumping her fists. After that, Tine committed to three unforced errors as Saina burst into celebration.
Saina next meets world no. 1 Wang Yihan in the semi-finals and a victory in that match would ensure at least a silver medal.
However, it was end of the road for Kashyap after his gallant fight against world No 2 and top seed Lee Chong Wei of Malaysia in a gruelling quarterfinal of the men’s singles lost 19-21 11-21.
In the first game, Kashyap dictated the pace of the game as he opened up a 11-8 lead at the interval. But Chong Wei varied the pace of the rallies and clawed back to level the scores at 15-15. Kashyap matched his superior rival stroke by stroke and didn’t give up and was leading 19-18.
But in the end, it was the experienced Malaysian who pocketed the game as he forced the Indian to commit errors and registered three quick points to edge past him. In the second game, Lee started dominating. He mixed his strokes beautifully and executed his smashes to perfection to floor Kashyap. He led 11-6 at the break.
The Indian showed some spark but in his pursuit to match the Malaysian’s strokes, he ended up committing unforced errors. With Chong Wei gaining 10 game points at 20-10, Kashyap saved a couple of points but it was all over when his return hit the net.
Saina’s superb display came as a balm for the Indian contingent after the listless display put up by Sodhi in the men’s double trap in which the Asian Games gold medalist even failed to enter the final by finishing a distant 11th out of 24 competitors.
Sodhi, a medal favourite prior to the Games along with Beijing Olympics hero Abhinav Bindra and Gagan Narang, put up a miserable display in the second and third rounds after starting promisingly with a score of 48 out of 50 in the opening round that put paid to his hopes.
The 32-year-old Firozepur-born marksman, who was the lone gold medal winner for the country in the Guangzhou Asiad two years ago, finished with a tally of 134 out of 150 and made his exit.
The world No. 10 admitted that this was easily his worst performance in the international arena in the last few years. The 32-year-old Sodhi, however, refused to agree that his performance was related to the stage fright that top Indian athletes have suffered over the years during their participation at the quadrennial extravaganza. (PTI)