Badminton News
At SCG Thomas & Uber Cup 2010 Preliminary Asia Zone, Thailand

Thomas Cup - Semi Finals

India l Korea 1-3

Parupalli Kashyap (IND,30) l Sung Hwan Park (KOR,13) 16-21 17-21 (36 mins)
Sanave Thomas (IND)/ Rupesh Kumar (IND) l Jae Sung Jung (KOR)/ Ji Man Hwang (KOR) 10-21 20-22 (28 mins)
Arvind Bhatt (IND,33) bt Wan Ho Shon (KOR,49) 21-13 21-15 (30 mins)
V Diju (IND)/ Chetan Anand (IND) l Sung Hyun Ko (KOR)/ Yeon Seong Yoo (KOR) 21-16 15-21 9-21 (37 mins)

Uber Cup - Group Y

India bt Chinese Taipei 3-2

Saina Nehwal (IND,7) bt Hsiao Huan Chen (TPE,77) 21-15 21-14 (28 mins)
Shruti Kurian (IND)/ Aparna Balan (IND) l Yu Chin Chien (TPE)/ Pei Rong Wang (TPE) 21-11 14-21 18-21 (38 mins)
Sayali Gokhale (IND,59) bt Shih Han Hung (TPE,97) 15-21 21-10 23-21 (48 mins)
Jwala Gutta (IND)/ Ashwini Ponnappa (IND) bt Wen Hsing Cheng (TPE)/ Hsin Yun Chang (TPE) 21-16 21-16 (25 mins)
Trupti Murgunde (IND,61) l Hsiao Ma Pai (TPE,154) 14-21 12-21 (26 mins)

Indian men lost to Korea in Thomas cup Asian zone tournament ... P. Kashyap played first match and lost in straight games against top-15 Park ... In doubles we changed our pair but Korean pairs were too strong for our pairs ... Arvind won third match to keep our challenge alive but Diju and Rupesh lost their match and tie after winning first game ... Tomorrow we r facing Japan for #3 position match.

Our women team also qualify for semi-final with well contested win over Chinese Taipei ... Saina Nehwal scored comfortable victory ... Shruti Kurian and Aparna Balan r still struggling with their form and lost another match ... That's put extra pressure on our second string singles players ... Today Sayali Gokhale responded to the call and produced tight third game comeback victory over Shih Han Hung ... Jwala and Ashwini scored straight games victory to secure tie for India ... In semis we will face Indonesia.

Our men team got lucky break with easy pool but importantly they utilized that ... So now if we finish on 4th losing next matche still we will qualify for Thomas Cup Final in May 2010 at Kuala Lumpur ... Top 3 teams will get direct entry from Asia Zone and 4th team from Asian zone and European Zone having toss-up between them on basis of singles ranking of players .. Our players ranking is far too better than Ukrainian players who finished 4th from European zone ... That's why I say we secure our ticket for Thomas Cup Final in May 2010 but I luv if we finish inside top-3 and get automatic qualification.