PARIS, Oct 24: Top Indian shuttlers Saina Nehwal and Kidambi Srikanth advanced to the second round of the French Open with straight-game wins but it was curtains for Sameer Verma at the USD 750,000 BWF event here on Wednesday.
Saina, who finished runner-up in the Denmark Open last week, outclassed Japan�s Saena Kawakami 21-11 21-11 in the women�s singles, while defending champion Srikanth beat Hong Kong�s Wong Wing Ki Vincent 21-19 21-13 in the men�s singles match in the opening round of the World Tour Super 750 event.
World No. 10 Saina will face either 2017 world champion Nozomi Okuhara of Japan or Spain�s Beatriz Corrales next. Fifth seeded Srikanth will meet Korean Lee Dong Keun.
Sameer, who had reached the quarterfinals last week, went down fighting 21-16 17-21 15-21 to Asian Games gold medallist Jonatan Christie of Indonesia in a little over an hour match.
Men�s doubles pair of Manu Attri and B Sumeeth Reddy defeated Korean duo of Min Hyuk Kang and Kim Won Ho 21-18 21-17. They will square off against either Chinese third seeds Liu Cheng and Zhang Nan or Danish combination of Mathias Boe and Carsten Mogensen. � PTI
