Indian shuttlers Sameer Verma, Kiran George and Ashmita Chaliha notched up straight-game wins over their respective opponentsin the qualifying round toprogress to the main draw of the singles event at the Thailand Open Super 500 badminton tournament here on Tuesday.
On a comeback trail, former world No. 11 Sameer, who won the Slovenia Open recently, beat Malaysia’s Yeoh Seng Zoe 21-12, 21-17 after getting two walkovers — Indonesia’s Christian Adinata and Spain’s Luis Enrique Penalver in the previous rounds.
He will face Denmark’s Magnus Johannesen in the opening round of the main draw.
Kiran outwitted fellow Indian Kartikey Gulshan Kumar 21-14, 21-18 and then defeated Korea’s Jeon Hyeok Jin 21-10, 21-14 to make it to the main draw. He will face third seed Chinese Shi Yuqi on Wednesday.
In women’s singles, Ashmita Chaliha, who recently topped BAI’s selection trials to make it to individual events of the upcoming Asian Games, saw off fellow Indian Unnati Hooda 21-16, 13-21, 21-19 before beating Estonian Kristin Kuuba 21-19, 21-11 in the second match.
She will meet compatriot Malvika Bansod.
Rankings improve
India’s top doubles pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty gained a place to achieve a career-best ranking of world No.4 in the latest BWF rankings issued on Tuesday.
HS Prannoy jumped one place to regain the world No. 8 ranking, while Kidambi Srikanth climbed three positions to get his place back in the top 20. He is 20th. Lakshya Sen, however, slipped a place to world No. 23.
In women’s singles, PV Sindhu remained static at 13th spot, while Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand also stayed at the 15th position in women’s doubles.
