Saina, Jwala-Ashwini win, others ousted

Top shuttler Saina Nehwal along with leading Indian doubles combine Jwala Gutta and Ashwini Ponnappa notched up first round wins at the $750,000 Indonesia Open Super Series Premier here Wednesday.

However, World Championship bronze medallist P.V. Sindhu, Kidambi Srikanth and Parupalli Kashyap had to bite the dust as they were ousted from the competition at the Istora Gelora Bung Karno Stadium.

A three-time winner here, Saina needed only 33 minutes to ease past Thailand's Porntip Buranaprasertsuk 21-15, 21-10 to take an amazing 7-1 lead in career meetings over the World No.9.

The eighth seed will meet Scottish Kirsty Gilmour in the women's singles second round against whom Saina has an unbeaten 2-0 head-to-head.

Jwala and Ashwini too came out with a brilliant performance to oust World No.11 Indonesians Pia Zebadiah Bernadeth and Rizki Amelia Pradipta to proceed to the women's doubles second round. The Commonwealth Games gold medallists needed only 49 minutes to win 13-21, 22-20, 21-11 in their first encounter against Pia and Rizki.

Later, Sindhu's match didn't turn out as she had expected. The World No.10 Hyderabadi gave a good fight to China's third seed Yihan Wang by taking the first game a long way before losing out 24-26.

Sindhu fought brilliantly but ran out of steam to lose the second game too to the former World Champion 17-21.

In men's singles action, China's Chen Yuekun beat Srikanth 21-12, 17-21, 21-16 in 55 minutes while Japanese fourth seed Kenichi Tago ousted Parupalli Kashyap 19-21, 21-8, 24-22 in an hour and nine minutes.