Thomas cooked in Gopi fire

Hyderabad, Dec 5: Semi-finalists in the men's section and quarter-finalists in the women's section were spotted on the second day of the f...

Hyderabad, Dec 5: Semi-finalists in the men8217;s section and quarter-finalists in the women8217;s section were spotted on the second day of the four-day Servo Indian Oil Asian Satellite badminton tournament, at Lal Bahadur Indoor Stadium today.

National champion P Gopi Chand, junior champion Chetan Anand, Ajit Wijetilak and Siddharth Jain entered the men8217;s semifinals, while top seed BR Meenakshi, G Jwala, Trupti Murgunde, Ch Deepthi, Ketki Thakkar, Divya Ramesh, PVV Lakshmi and Parul Priyadarshini qualified for the women quarterfinals.

Gopi Chand and Thomas Kurien were engaged in a 41-minute clash, and Gopi had to bring out all his experience to quell the Kurien8217;s challenge. He dribbled to perfection and with Kurien tossing the shuttle to a reasonable high, Gopi went for the kill with ease.

Gopi took the first game 15-9, but Kurien got off to a flying 9-0 start in the second. Nothing went right for Gopi, who had a heated argument with the service umpire when he was called for service fault. Like a truechampion, he bounced back by regaining his cool and composure. He wiped off the deficit by unleashing powerful cross court smashes and won 15-13.

RESULTS :

Men singles QF: P Gopi Chand Ind bt Thomas Kurien Ind 15-9 15-13; Ajit Wijetilak Ind bt Anuj Gupta Ind 15-13 15-11; Chetan Anand Ind bt Rajeev Bagga Ind 15-13 15-11; Siddharth Jain Ind bt Joy Anthony Ind 15-12 15-12.

Men doubles QF: Jaseel Ismail amp; Vincent Lobo Ind bt JBS Vidyadhar amp; Manoj Kumar Ind 15-7 11-15 15-9; Vinod Kumar amp; Rajeev Bagga Ind bt Ranasinghe amp; Gunaratne SL 15-3 15-2, Anuj Gupta amp; Thomas Kurien Ind bt Edirisinghe amp; Fernando SL 15-2 15-6, Markose Bristow amp; Vijaydeep Singh Ind bt Sempa Peruma amp; P Sunil Ind 15-4 15-1.

Women singles PQF: T Murgunde Ind bt Shruti Kurien Ind 11-7 11-2, PVV Lakshmi Ind bt K Geegange SL 11-3 11-4, B R Meenakshi Ind bt Shakeela Moosa Mal 11-0 11-2, Ketki Thakkar Ind bt Eleena Begum Ban 11-5 11-3, G Jwala Ind bt N Gayanthi SL 11-1 11-0, ParulPriyadarshini Ind bt Namalee Erandika SL 11-1 11-0, Ch Deepthi Ind bt Ayesha Khatoon Nuri Ban 11-1 11-2, Divya Ramesh Ind bt Shaeen Rasheed Mal 11-2 11-0.

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Women doubles QF: PVV Lakshmi amp; Archana Deodhar Ind bt Shaheen Rasheed amp; Shakeela Moosa Mal 15-5 15-0, BR Meenakshi amp; Ch Deepthi Ind bt M Radhika amp; Srilakshmi Ind 15-5 15-10, G Jwala amp; Shruthi Kurien Ind bt Sampada Shetye amp; Madhavi Kashikar Ind 15-0 15-11; Ketki Thakkar amp; T Murgunde Ind bt Elena Begum amp; Ayesha Katoon Ban 15-11 15-8.

Mixed doubles semis: Vinod Kumar amp; Meenakshi Ind bt Mahbubbur Rab amp; Ayesha Ban 15-2 15-1; JBS Vidyadhar amp; PVV Lakshmi Ind bt Vincent Lobo amp; Archana Deodhar Ind 15-9 11-15 15-10.

Gade-Christensen tops: Peter Gade-Christensen won his first badminton World Grand Prix Finals titlein Brunei today, beating Marleve Mainaky of Indonesia 15-11, 15-3. In women8217;s singles, Ye Zhaoying beat world number one Dai Yun to capture her third Finals. She won 11-4, 6-11, 11-9.