Pillai, Pandit Neha enter pre-quarterfinals at badminton meet

Second seed Riya Pillai of Mumbai Suburbs and fourth-seeded defending champion Neha Pandit of Pune advanced to the women's singles pre-quarterfinals of the Safal Group-Maharashtra State Senior Badminton Championships today.
However, their passage into the last 16 was not easy as Riya Arolkar from Mumbai and Mrunmayee Saoji of Nagpur troubled Pillai and Pandit, respectively before falling by the wayside in the tournament organised by Sports United at the Chembur Gymkhana here.
Pillai was off to a fine start against Riya as she grabbed the first game 15-6, but the junior player won the second game 15-14 to take the tie to the decider. However, Pillai, having much more experience, turned on the heat and won the third game 15-6 to enter the next stage.

Pandit, the women's defending champion, after helping Pune to win the inter-district title last night, was a bit off colour and Saoji made her run around the court to win the first game 15-13.
But the title holder fought back to put an end to the spirited challenge from the Nagpur girl with a 13-15 15-12 15-10 win.
In another close encounters, Nagpur girl Bhakti Dahahersa scored an impressive 15-12 3-15 15-7 win over Mumbai Suburbs' Kairavi Thakore.

Richa Dawda, brought more joy to her Nagpur supporters by beating Aurangabad's Sayli Kale 15-9 10-15 15-13.
In the men's singles, Thane's Rohit More rallied to win over Nagpur's Govind Sahasrabuddhe 13-15 15-6 15-10.

Nagpur's Ninad Kamat, who played a major role in taking his team into semifinals of the inter-district championships, put up another fine show as he beat Solapur's Shripad Pardeshi 15-10 14-15 15-5.
The old scoring system is being used in the first few rounds.