Star shuttler of India Saina Nehwal guided the Hyderabad Hotshots to a 3-2 victory over Mumbai Masters in the inaugural Indian Badminton League at the Shiv Chhatrapati Sports Complex in Balewadi on Thursday.
World number one Lee Chong Wei of Mumbai Masters hauled a thrilling victory in the opening match. However, the Hotshots bounced back as Saina won her women's singles. Moreover, the men's doubles combo of V Shem Goh and W L Khim and further men's singles player Tanongsak Saensomboonsuk emerged as victorious to settle the tie in Hyderabad's favor.
After registering three victories from four outings, the Hotshots proved to be the topper of the table with 15 points. Notably, two-time silver medalist at the Olympics, Lee of Mumbai Masters scored a thrilling 21-19 11-21 11-5 to win over Ajay Jayaram of Hyderabad in the first men's singles that continued for 47 minutes.
After his victory, Lee Chong narrated that initially the wind was very high and he decided to begin slow. However, it took him some time to adapt but the warm up gave good outcome. He is glad with the win. They are one up already.
Remarkably, world number four Saina Nehwal hammered P C Thulasi by 21-7 21-10 in a 28-minute women's singles match to bring Hyderabad's campaign back on track. Saina expressed that she feels so good to win all the matches she has played till date. She came here for the World Championship last time and got similar support from Pune. She is happy to make her fans in Pune happy once again.
Subsequently, Hyderabad's Goh and Khim took the court against B S Reddy and Manu Attri of Mumbai in the men's doubles match. Actually, the duo rallied from a game down to award the Hotshots a 2-1 lead with a 11-21 21-16 11-9 victory. Goh and Khim commented after registering the victory that both Reddy and Attri played very well which put them under pressure right from the beginning. But the cheers of the spectators for their team brought them back in the game.
At that moment, the responsibility was on Marc Zweibler of Germany to bring Mumbai back into the competition, but the world number 12 was stunned by 21-19 17-21 11-6 by the 19th ranked Saensomboonsuk of Thailand, to give Hyderabad an indisputable 3-1 lead.
Tanongsak admitted that he really enjoyed playing. He added that Marc was good contender for him but his confidence levels were very high from the beginning and that reflected in his winning shots.
However, Mumbai managed to decrease the margin of defeat with Vladimir Ivanov and Sikki Reddy who trounced Tarun Kona and Padyna Gadre of Hyderabad by 21-18 21-19 in the mixed doubles match.
