Defending Champion India faces Thailand in their Thomas Cup Opener.
While the Thomas Cup is the world badminton team championship for men, the Uber Cup is the women’s version. Both championships are held simultaneously biannually.
Indian badminton player B Sai Praneeth started his Japan Open campaign with a convincing win against Japan’s Kento Nishimoto in the first round of the tournament at Tokyo on Tuesday.
Praneeth who failed to put up an impressive show in the recently concluded Indonesia Open after he lost to Wong Wing Ki Vincent, went on to beat his opponent Nishimoto 21-17, 21-13 claiming victory in two straight games.
The badminton contest lasted for about forty-two minutes. Notably, the Indian shuttler was not part of the last edition of this tournament. A confident outing in the first open will now help him do well in the rest of the tournament.
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In the mixed doubles category, Ashwini Ponappa and Satwiksairaj Rankireddy also moved to the second round registering an easy win against Linda Efler and Marvin Seidel of Germany. The Indian duo won the match in just 33 minutes beating their opponents 21-14, 21-19.
It is not all happy news for Indian fans as the Indian men’s doubles saw Attri Manu and Reddy B. Sumeeth lose to Goh Sze Fei and Nur Izzudin 12-21, 16-21 in an equally convincing win for the opponent pair.
Top-ranked Indian shuttlers PV Sindhu and Kidambi Srikanth will begin their campaign on Wednesday. While Sindhu is set to face Chine’s Yue Han, Srikant will be up against HS Prannoy.
Sameer Verma will lock horns with Anders Antonsen of Denmark in the opening round encounter.
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