Saina enters Indonesia Masters final, Satwik-Chirag bow out

Star Indian shuttler Saina Nehwal stormed into the final, while the men's doubles pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty bowed out of the $350,000 Indonesia Masters World Tour Super 500 in the semi-final here on Saturday.

Saina, the 2012 Olympic bronze medallist, took 49 minutes to defeat Thai fourth seed and former world champion Ratchanok Intanon 21-19, 21-19.

Saina, who now leads the head-to-head tie 8-5 against Ratchanok, will play Sunday's final against Chinese Taipei's top seeded Tai Tzu Ying, who got the better of Chinese eighth seed He Bingjiao 19-21, 21-15, 21-15.

Both the games remained close with Intanon taking a slender 3-1 lead in the beginning which was pulled back by Saina to level things at 5-5.

However, the Thailand shuttler took an upper hand to further take a 13-11 lead. In the closing minutes, Saina kept her calm to clinch the game.

In the second game, Saina dominated the proceedings from the onset to take an 17-11 advantage.

Failing to maintain the lead, the fourth seed came from behind to level things at 18-18 but gave away the game to Saina who looked contended to clinch the match.

Meanwhile, Satwik and Chirag ended their run in straight games against world No.1 pair Marcus Fernaldi Gideon and Kevin Sanjaya Sukamuljo in the semi-finals.

The world No.32 failed to get their combination right and lost 14-21, 11-21 in half an hour.

The Indian pair had upset two top-10 players in the run to the semi-finals.

In men's singles, 21-year-old Indonesian rising star Anthony Sinisuka Ginting thrilled the home crowd by following up his upset of Chinese reigning Olympic gold medallist Chen Long with a 21-16, 13-21, 21-12 semi-final victory over Taiwan's Chou Tien-chen, reports Efe.

Next up for the speedy Ginting in Sunday's final will be Japan's Kazumasa Sakai, a 21-18, 20-22, 21-15 winner over fifth-ranked South Korean Son Wan-ho.

--IANS

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