Saina assures herself historic Asian Games medal

India's top shuttler Saina Nehwal today assured herself of a historic Asian Games medal after reaching the women's singles semifinals following a straight-game win over world no. 4 Ratchanok Inthanon of Thailand here.

The last Indian to return with an individual medal from the Continental event was legendary Syed Modi, way back in 1982.

India has won eight badminton medals at the Asian Games and six of them are in team events and one on men's doubles.

Saina is assured of at least a bronze as she erased a huge deficit in the opening game to knock out former world champion Ratchanok 21-18 21-16 in a 42-minute quarterfinal.

Saina fell behind 3-8 at the beginning but found a way to beat the Thai player, whom she had beaten at the recent World Championship in Nanjing and also at the Indonesian Master at the same venue.

Saina said she was not aware who won the last individual medal.

"We were actually discussing that. We did not know. Gopi sir said keep the phone away," said the world no 10 Indian.

She came into this match with a superior record with four wins in the last five meetings against the Thai.

"She was playing strong and I knew she will challenge me today. I was taking her seriously, she had beaten Sung Ji Hyun in the previous match and first time I saw her playing well against a rally player," Saina said.

Talking about her tactics after falling behind in the opening game, Saina said, "I was not moving that well initially but after 12-3 I opened up and I started picking up those tough shots.

"Then one-two rallies happened and there I saw her getting tired but she was very tough. She was playing attacking."
"She had the lead, I had the good record against her, crowd was shouting (for Indonesian player on adjacent court), so many things were playing in my mind. You could not hear the shuttle (due to noise), you have to be alert."