Saina Nehwal, HS Prannoy pick up titles with fighting wins

Nagpur: Saina Nehwal upstaged P.V. Sindhu over two-well contested games to clinch the women’s title in the senior national badminton championship while H.S. Prannoy saw off Kidambi Srikanth to win the men’s singles here on Wednesday.

The 27-year-old former world number one Saina won 21-17, 27-25 in a contest stretching 54 minutes. “I am surprised with the way I played today. I moved well and picked Sindhu’s difficult shots,” Saina said later.

Second seed Prannoy, who achieved his career-best world no. 11 ranking last week, saw off top seed Srikanth 21-15, 16-21, 21-7 in a 49-minute in the 82nd edition of the tournament.

Ashwini Ponnappa claimed two titles — the mixed doubles with Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and women’s doubles with N. Sikki Reddy.

Second seeds Manu Attri and B. Sumeeth Reddy bounced back three-match points to beat top seeds Satwik and Chirag Shetty 15-21, 22-20, 25-23 in the men’s doubles final.

The match of the day was undoubtedly Saina vs Sindhu. The crowd reverberated with cheers of ‘Saina’, ‘Sindhu’ and ‘India’ as both engaged in exciting rallies.

The duo split the initial 10 points before Saina took a 10-7 and then 11-9 lead in the first game. She extended her lead to 17-12 before Sindhu reeled off four points to keep pace. But unforced errors in the next four points saw Sindhu surrender the first game.

The second game went down to the wire with both refusing to concede an inch. Sindhu got a 5-2 headstart. Saina clawed her way back to 6-6, but Sindhu held a 11-8 advantage at the break.

Sindhu extended her lead to 14-10 and then 18-14. But unforced errors again undid her good work, allowing Saina to draw parity at 18-18.

Sindhu then saved a match point but Saina eventually broke the deadlock when Sindhu failed to retrieve a return.