cOvERSTORy - Official 2016 Australian Badminton Open

cOvERSTORy
Chak de, saina!
India’s Saina Nehwal takes the women’s singles title at the 2014 Star Australian Badminton Open
BY
UTTAM
MUkHERJEE
s
unday, 29 June was a
proud day for India
as badminton player
24-year-old Saina
Nehwal became the
first non-Chinese player to win
the women’s singles title at a Super
Series in 2014, after defeating
Spain’s Carolina Marin 21-18, 2111 in 43 minutes.
The pair had met once before,
and Saina also won in that
instance. The first game of the
women’s singles finals had some
semblance of a fight between
six-seed Saina and Carolina; the
second game, however, was quite
one sided.
Saina moved around the court
quickly and returned difficult
shots easily. Her younger
opponent, considered one of the
feistiest players on the circuit, had
played well until the semi-finals,
but struggled to match Saina.
In the first game, Carolina
narrowed the gap time and again
but Saina was able to exploit her
weaknesses to the hilt, especially
around the net. Carolina did not
help herself as she committed
a service error to gift an easy
point to Saina. This ruffled her
confidence and the rhythm of
her serves. Carolina played some
good strokes but they were neither
consistent nor enough to snatch
an advantage. Saina on the other
hand made few unforced errors
and was ruthless in smashing her
opponent.
For every point that Carolina
won she let out a victorious shout,
but Saina was generally composed
except for a couple of times when
she pumped the air after winning
a major point. After winning the
championship, Saina let out a
victory cry and threw her racquet
32 JULY (2) 2014
12 JULY (1) 2014
into the crowd. Except for the
initial exuberance soon after her
victory, Saina remained quite calm
and composed thereafter.
“This is one victory which
answered all the doubts,” Saina
said. “There were many who
thought I could never win again.
This is a very special triumph for
me because I believed I could win
very soon and it happened”.
When asked how it felt to win
the Australian Super Series, she
said that the victory was quite
unexpected and although she felt
happy to have won, the feeling
of winning had not yet sunk
in. “Surely this was the biggest
challenge because I had to prove
that I still am one of the best
players in the world,” a confident
Saina stated.
Her march to the finals was
dramatic. In the quarter-finals,
Saina had vanquished Japan’s
Eriko Hirose in straight sets: 2118 and 21-9. In the semi-finals,
Saina played cautiously against
the number one seed, Wang
Shixian from China. Saina won
the gruelling match 21-19, 1621 and 21-15. This was a major
victory considering her
opponent was
better ranked, and the stadium
reverberated with loud cheering
for Wang Shixian.
Coming to Australia for the
championship, her parents
felt that she did not stand a
chance of winning but could
only play her best. Saina lightheartedly
told the media that she would
party all night to celebrate this
surprise win.
Saina complained about the
blisters on her feet that caused
much agony throughout the
tournament. During the semifinals she had to take time out
during the match as her feet had
to be attended to by her physio.
She said that her feet hurt as
she walked from her hotel to
the stadium! Saina thanked her
physio profusely saying that
without her help, and words of
encouragement, she would not
have been able to play in the
finals. But while she was on
court destroying her opponent,
no one realised that her feet
were sore and in
bandages!
Few in
Australia
discuss the
game of
badminton.
But leading up to
the Star Australian Open Badminton
Super Series Championship, I was
amused to hear my colleagues, who
are diehard rugby followers, talking
about badminton. Earlier in the
week a leading Sydney newspaper
had carried an article on Lin
Dan, the bad boy of badminton,
and Olympic bronze medallist,
Saina, who were in town for the
competition from 24-29 June. The
$750,000 tournament in Australia
was the eighth Super Series
tournament this year and hugely
popular.
The Sport Centre in Sydney
Olympic Park drew a record crowd
for the Superseries finals and unlike
previous years, the capacity crowd
had a sizeable number of people
of Indian origin. I was also
pleasantly surprised to
see two large Indian flags
prominently displayed
in the stands to cheer
on Saina Nehwal
in the finals. This
atmosphere
was in contrast
to the earlier
qualifying
rounds where
Saina was
cheered loudly
by just two
very enthusiastic
supporters!
In the climax
of the Australian
Open Badminton
championship,
the bad boy of
badminton, Lin
Dan won against Indonesia’s
Simon Santoso: 22-24, 21-16,
21-7(pictured right). The first
game was a see-saw battle where
Simon upstaged the double
Olympic and five time world
champion. But in the next two
sets Lin Dan proved to us why
he is considered a great. It was
www.indianlink.com.au
www.indianlink.com.au
the finest exhibition of
strokes that one could
hope to see.
I always look forward
to the men’s doubles
as they are fast and
furious. Although my
favourite doubles
player, Kido from
Indonesia, lost in the
semi-finals, I was
mesmerised by the
Korean pair, Yong
Dae Lee and Yeon
Seong Yoo who
won comfortably
21-14, 21-18.
For the past three
years I
have been attending the Australian
Badminton Open, and this was
the first year when China did not
dominate the finals. It was good
to see representation in the
finals from many countries
across the world.
Here is some spicy news that I
came across - Saina Nehwal has
just been named on the Indian
NATIONAL EDITION
NATIONAL EDITION
Saina moved
around the court
quickly and
returned difficult
shots easily. Her
younger opponent,
considered as one of
the feistiest players
on the circuit, had
played well until
the semi-finals,
but struggled to
match Saina
FHM 100 Sexiest Women’s list. At
number 85 Saina is ahead of Miley
Cyrus and only five spots behind
Beyonce on the list!
And which international
sportswoman has the most
Facebook followers? If you
thought it was one of the Williams
sisters or Anna Kournikova you
are wrong. It is Saina Nehwal!
JULY (2) 2014 33
JULY (1) 2014 13