India’s top seeded pair of Ashwini Ponnappa and N Sikki Reddy advanced to the semi-finals of the women’s doubles at the Hyderabad Open badminton after getting past fellow Indians Meghana Jakkampudi and Poorvisha Ram in straight sets.

Ponnappa-Reddy won 21-16, 21-15 against their opponents to set up a semi-final clash against Hong Long’s Ka Yan Fan-Yi Ting Wu.
In men’s singles, seventh seed Sourabh Verma eased past his fellow countrymen Ajay Jayaram to make it to the last four. Verma won 21-18, 21-9 and is now set to face Malaysia’s Iskander Zulkarnian in the semi-final on Saturday.
However, fifth seed Subhankar Dey’s tournament came to an end after he lost to Singapore’s Kean Yew Loh in straight games. This sees Sourabh Verma become the only remaining Indian player in the men’s singles category.
Both the men’s doubles pair that were left in contingent faced heartbreak as they suffered losses to head back home. Second seed Manu Attri and Sumeeth Reddy lost 19-21, 21-11, 21-17 to South Korean pair of Sung Seung Na and Chan Wang while MR Arjun and Shlok Ramachandran lost to Chinese Taipei’s Jhe-Huei Lee and Po-Hsuan Yang 21-19, 21-9.
Also Read:
Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty storm into the top 10 in badminton rankings