Shuttlers Jayaram, Gurusaidutt reach Dutch Open quarters

Indian shuttlers Ajay Jayaram and R.M.V. Gurusaidutt advanced to the men's singles quarterfinals with straight-game victories at the $50,000 Dutch Open Grand Prix here on Thursday.

Third seed Jayaram, who reached the Korea Open final last month, had a comfortable 21-14, 21-13 win in 31 minutes over Kasper Lehikoinen of Finland at the Topsportcentrum Almere here. Later, ninth seed Gurusaidutt defeated Ukraine's Dmytro Zavadsky 21-12, 21-11 in 33 minutes in the third round.

Men's doubles second seeds Manu Attri and B. Sumeeth Reddy, due to the withdrawal of local pair of Ruben Jille and Robin Tabeling, reached the second round without raising their racquets.

However, it was the end of the road for P.C. Thulasi who lost to Irish Chloe Magee 19-21, 23-21, 19-21 in an hour and 19 minutes in the women's singles second round.

Then, Scottish pair of Martin Campbell and Patrick Machugh took care of men's doubles eight seeds Pranaav Jerry Chopra and Akshay Dewalkar, winning 21-14, 21-18 in 43 minutes.

Earlier on Wednesday, Jayaram and Commonwealth Games bronze medallist Gurusaidutt won their respective first two matches to enter the third round.

Mumbai's Jayaram first overcame local boy Mark Caljouw 19-21, 21-17, 21-18 in an hour and four minutes before beating German Fabian Roth 21-14, 21-10 in just under half an hour to proceed to the pre-quarterfinals.

Gurusaidutt later easily overcame Belgian Maxime Moreels 21-8, 21-9 in 27 minutes before beating Chinese Taipei's Chun-Wei Chen 21-14, 21-19 in 38 minutes.

But fourth seed B. Sai Praneeth, who defeated Danish Steffen Rasmussen 21-15, 21-11 in 33 minutes in the first round, went down to another Dane, Rasmus Fladberg, 15-21, 21-7, 12-21 in 48 minutes in the second round.

Another Indian who was ousted from the category was 14th seed Anand Pawar, losing to Iskandar Zulkarnain Zainuddin in 34 minutes. The Malaysian beat the Mumbaikar 21-10, 21-15.

Meanwhile, Thulasi had enough steam in her to edge past Dutchwoman Gayle Mahulette in 57 minutes. The Kerala shuttler eventually won 20-22, 21-15, 21-16.

Dutch second seeds Jacco Arends and Selena Piek also took care of Indian mixed doubles pair of Tarun Kona and N. Sikki Reddy, winning 21-16, 21-15 in the opener.