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Saina wins, Bhat loses opening singles in Badminton team event
India's badminton campaign at the Asian Games started on a mixed note as Saina Nehwal triumphed in the women's team event but Arvind Bhat lost his singles match of the men's team event in Guangzhou on Saturday.
India's badminton campaign at the Asian Games started on a mixed note as Saina Nehwal triumphed in the women's team event but Arvind Bhat lost his singles match of the men's team event in Guangzhou on Saturday.
In the women's tie between India and Indonesia, Saina gave India a winning start by beating Adriyanti Firdasari 21-16 21-17 in the first singles match in just 30 minutes.
Saina was extremely good at net as she hit 16 winners to nine of her Indonesian opponent.
However, Bhat could not give India a good start in the men's team event against Chinese Taipei as he lost to Yu Hsing Hsieh.
Bhat came well after losing the close opening game but eventually lost 26-28 21-15 13-21 after 52 minute battle.
There was not much to separate the two players as the Taipei player hit 22 smash winners to 25 of the Indian.
Hsing was though slightly better at net and in rallies and that helped his cause.
Now India's men's doubles pair of Sanave Arattukulam and Akshay Dewalkar will have to pull off a win in the next match to bring India back in the tie.
They are up against Chieh-Min Fang and Sheng Mu Lee.
