Basel: Former men’s singles champion Kidambi Srikanth and the mixed doubles pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Ashwini Ponnappa progressed to the quarterfinals of the Swiss Open Super 300 badminton tournament in Basel on Thursday.
While fourth seed Srikanth, who had won the title in 2015, notched up a 21-10 14-21 21-14 victory over world no.50 Thomas Rouxel of France, the world no.19 pair of Satwik and Ashwini defeated the Indonesian combination of Rinov Rivaldy and Pitha Haningtyas Mentari 21-18 21-16 in another second-round match.
Srikanth, a former world no 1, will face either sixth seeded Thai Kantaphon Wangcharoen or Netherland’s Mark Caljouw in the last-eight stage.
Satwik and Ashwini, who reached the semifinals at Thailand Open Super 1000 in January, will meet the winner of the match between fifth-seeded Malaysians Tan Kian Meng and Lai Pei Jing and Germany’s Jones Ralfy Jansen and Kilasu Ostermeyer.
Earlier, two-time former champion Saina Nehwal bowed out of the tournament after a hard-fought first-round loss in the women’s singles opening round on Wednesday night.
The London Olympic bronze-medallist battled for 58 minutes before going down 16-21 21-17 21-23 to Phittayaporn Chaiwan of Thailand.
The other Indian in the event, PV Sindhu, however, entered the round of 16 by beating Yigit Neslihan of Turkey 21-16 21-19 in her first-round match. The second-seeded Sindhu will face Iris Wang of USA in her Round of 16 match later on Thursday.
