Badminton News
At $50K Bitburger Open Grand Prix 2008, Saarbrucken, Germany

[F] Aditi Mutatkar (IND,51) vs Maria Febe Kusumastuti (INA,96) 24-22 8-21 21-23

[F] Diju Valiyaveetil (IND)/ Jwala Gutta (IND) bt (8) Joachim Fischer Nielsen (DEN)/ Christinna Pedersen (DEN) 8-21 21-17 22-20

[F] (4) Chetan Anand (IND,30) bt (7) Arvind Bhat (IND,42) 23-25 24-22 23-21

Aditi was down 7-12 in the first game but after that Aditi take lead ... Kusumastuti tried to turn table, she saved 3 game point but Aditi converted 4th to won first game in 18 mins ... But in second game Kusumastuti didn't give any chance to Aditi to win it in 11 mins ... In third game Aditi kept 1/2 pts lead but Kusumastuti leveled on 17-all ... Aditi then take lead and had 3 championship points ... But Kusumastuti fought back and captured title on second match point in 49 mins ... Big lost opportunity for Aditi but still creditable performance from her to produced her best result in this 4 star tournament.

In MXD final, Diju and Jwala produced excellent fightback after losing first game ... They defeated 4th seeded pair to won MXD title in 4 mins ... This is their biggest title as a pair.

Chetan and Arvind had excellent final match ... Arvind won first game in closely fought encounter, Chetan also had game point in this but couldn't convert it ... Second game also went as first game ... Both players had another close encounter ... But in crucial moment Chetan kept his cool to won this game to make it 1 game all.

Third game was classic ... From 11-all Arvind take control of this game to lead 19-14 but these days Chetan enjoying purple match ... He won 6 next points to grab first match-point ... Arvind saved another match point, but Chetan converted 3rd match point to won deserving title in 60 mins battle ... This is Chetan's biggest title win.

So very encouraging performance by our players as we won 2 titles, 2 finalists and a semi-finalist.