Saina sails into semis in Indonesia

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Defending champion Saina Nehwal sailed into the semi-finals of the Indonesian Super Series badminton with a straight-game victory over Carolina Marin of Spain on Saturday.
However, India’s campaign in the men’s singles event ended as both R.M.V. Gurusaidutt and Ajay Jayaram lost their respective quarter-finals.
Saina took 39 minutes to outplay the world no. 27 21-16, 21-19 in a women’s quarter-final at the Istora Gelora Bung Karno Stadium. The world no. 2 will take now take on no. 3 Juliane Schenk of Germany in the semi-final.
The first game was a close affair with neither shuttler giving an inch to the other. Tied at 12-12, Saina broke free to surge ahead. She kept on increasing the lead and finally sealed the game 21-13.
The Spaniard started off on a great note in the second game, opening up a 7-2 lead before extending it to 9-4. But Saina got her act together coming back strongly and made it 10-10. Carolina surged ahead again winning three consecutive points to take a slender 13-10 lead.
She continued to hold an upper hand in the game coming close to win it at 19-15. But just when she seemed to close out the game, the Hyderabadi bagged four points on the trot to make it 19-19. After that there was no looking back for Saina as she clinched two points to wrap up the match.
In the men’s singles, Gurusaidutt went down fighting 21-19, 11-21, 10-21 to Tommy Sugiarto of Indonesia in a contest that lasted an hour and six minutes. Jayaram, on the other hand, failed to negotiate the brilliant net play of Germany’s Marc Zwielber and lost 16-21, 15-21 in a 34-minute duel.