Birmingham, March 5 (IANS) Saina Nehwal began her All England Badminton Championship campaign with a comfortable win over Scotland’s Kirsty Gilmour here Wednesday. But India’s top male players, Parupalli Kashyap and Kidambi Srikanth, lost their opening round matches.
World No.7 Saina sailed past 20th ranked Gilmour 21-15, 21-6 in 32 minutes at the National Indoor Arena.
The Hyderabadi next faces American qualifier Beiwen Zhang, who got a walkover from Germany’s World No.11 Juliane Schenk.
The second Indian in the women’s singles draw, P.V. Sindhu, plays here first round against Sun Yu of China later Wednesday.
World No.19 Kashyap endured a tough loss against fifth ranked Kenichi Tago of Japan. Tago pipped the Indian 14-21, 21-19, 21-17 in a 75 minute battle.
World No.21 Srikanth also fell flat, losing 11-21, 15-21 to 15th-ranked Kento Memota of Japan.
