Top seed Saina Nehwal knocked out of French Open

Early exits at Japan Open and Denmark Open proved costly for ace India shuttler Saina Nehwal as she today lost her World No. 1 crown to All England and World champion Carolina Marin of Spain.

Indian badminton star Saina Nehwal was knocked out in tge quarterfinals of the French Open badminton tournament by Thailand’s Ratchanok Intanon.

In the prequarter-finals match, Saina had tamed Japanese Minatsu Mitani in straight games after two successive defeats against the Japanese at Japan Open and Denmark Open.

World Championships 2015 silver medallist Saina registered a 21-18, 21-13 win over world No. 15 Michelle Li of Canada at the Stade Pierre de Coubertin. While Srikanth slid a spot to be sixth, reigning Commonwealth Games champion Kashyap slipped two places to be at No.10.

Kashyap led 8-4 in the second game initially and even though Thomas did claw back at 8-8, the Indian moved ahead to 18-13. But Intanon kept putting pressure on Saina and clinched the second game 21-15 and made her way to the semifinals of the tournament.

Among others, HS Prannoy, Ajay Jayaram, and women’s doubles pair of Jwala Gutta and Ashwini Ponnappa lost in the second round on Thursday.