China Open: Saina Sails Through But Verman Crashes Out in Opener

Saina Nehwal beat her opponent in 29 minutes.

Ace Indian shuttler Saina Nehwal sailed into the women's singles second round of the China Open Super Series Premier with a straight-game win over USA's Beiwan Zhang.

Saina, who recently won the National Championships beating compatriot PV Sindhu in the final, hardly broke a sweat and needed exactly 30 minutes to tame Zhang 21-12 21-13 in her tournament opener.

In fifth seed Akane Yamaguchi, who beat China's Xiaoxin Chen 21-12, 21-14, Saina has drawn a tough opponent in the next round. The Indian trails the Japanese one to three in head-to- head record with their three previous results going in Yamaguchi's favour.

However, it was curtains for men's singles shuttler Sourabh Verma, who lost in the first round to France's Brice Leverdez 14-21 21-15 11-21.

The men's doubles pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty also failed to cross the opening hurdle, losing to Chinese pair of Cheng Liu and Nan Zhang 13-21 13-21.

(More to follow)