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

INDIA gained direct entry for Thoms Cup Final 2010.

Thomas Cup - For 3rd Position

Chetan Anand (IND,15) bt Sho Sasaki (JPN,29) 21-16 23-21 (32 mins)
Sanave Thomas (IND)/ Rupesh Kumar (IND) bt Hirokatsu Hashimoto (JPN)/ Noriyasu Hirata (JPN) 21-19 18-21 21-15 (47 mins)
Arvind Bhatt (IND,33) l Kazushi Yamada (JPN,44) 15-21 21-14 7-21 (47 mins)
V Diju (IND)/ Akshay Dewalkar (IND) l Kenta Kazuno (JPN)/ Kenichi Hayakawa (JPN) 21-17 16-21 19-21 (37 mins)
Anup Sridhar (IND,39) bt Shoji Sato (JPN,UNR) 21-7 19-21 24-22

Uber Cup - Semi Finals

India l Indonesia 0-3

Saina Nehwal (IND,7) l Adriyanti Firdasari (INA,22) 16-21 15-21 (28 mins)
Shruti Kurian (IND)/ Aparna Balan (IND) l Greysia Polii (INA)/ Nitya Krishinda Maheswari (INA) 16-21 15-21 (29 mins)
Sayali Gokhale (IND,59) l Maria Kristin Yulianti (INA,53) 22-24 12-22 (33 mins)

Chetan Anand gave good start for Indian team with winning his match in straight game ... But important win was from our top doubles team ... Rupesh and Sanave scored win in 3 games ... But Japan fought back winning next 2 matches ... Yamada upset Arvind winning third game very easily and in next doubles match Diju and Akshay lost after winning first game ... But in 5th deciding match Japan was playing with top doubles specialist Shoji Sato so Anup had a chance ... Anup dominateed first game winning it easily ... In second game Anup was up by 4 points in the start but Sato take lead from 12-all and was up 13-18, 15-19 ... Anup made it 19-all but Sato won next 2 points to take match into decider ... In third game Sato take early 2/3 points lead and maintained it until Anup caught with him at 17-all ... And first time take lead in deciding game 19-17, he had 2 match points at 20-18 but Sato saved those ... Anup again take lead 21-20, 22-21 but again both time Sato saved it ... But Anup converted 5th match point to secured win and tie for India.

So with that our men team officially qualified for 2010 Thomas cup final, last time we were qualified in 2006.

Indian women lost against Indonasin team in semis ... Was surprise to see Saina losing easily against Adriyanti Firdasari ... Against her Saina having so-so record ... In 2009 she lost against Adriyanti Firdasari at Korea Super Series but at Singapore Super Series Saina take revenge beating her in 3 games ... Today was different story.

Reaching semis in Uber Cup 2010 Preliminary Asia Zone tournament our women also secured their place in 2010 Uber Cup final, which will be played in May at Kuala Lumpur ... Same format like Thomas cup follw here, so 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 Dutch players who finished 4th from European zone.

Interestingly this is the first time we are qualified for Uber Cup final ... Heartily congratulation to our both teams!!!