Return to form and a couple of wins always gives an athlete a huge confidence boost. It's also amazing how much it changes, improves in fact, their interaction with fans, and the press. Banal, repetitive, and even potentially controversial questions, is guaranteed to be greeted with a wide smile, if not anything else.
After her fourth Indian Open Grand Prix Gold title win on Sunday, where she beat world champion Carolina Marin in three games in the final, Saina Nehwal was beaming ear to ear, as she held the trophy aloft on the podium in Lucknow. And after a few questions regarding her come-from-a-game-down win against the world No. 7 Marin, Saina was asked, "So when are you thinking of settling down?" The Hyderabadi was amused, and laughed it off, saying, "I just won a title, I thought you were asking about that. No, no, nothing about all that yet". It wasn't a smirk, there was no irritation in her voice or face, it was just a really wide grin. Had it been another time, when the shuttler was going through a lean patch, the response would have been very very different.
Saina indeed has left her lean patch far behind, and thanks coach Vimal Kumar for the turnaround. Since switching coaches at the time of last year's Asian Games, Saina has won a Super Series title (China Open), made it to the semi-final of the year-ender World Super Series finals, returned to Number 3 in the world rankings, and started the new year with an impressive win. "Vimal Sir has been working with me extremely hard, and you can see my results. I am playing better against the top players, and that has been the biggest difference", Saina told NDTV after defending her Indian Open title successfully.
There is still a lot of work to do though. Marin maybe ranked 7th in the world, but her extremely fast game had left Saina flustered in the opening game of the final. "I have played her twice before, and have won both times. But she has become so fast, her net game has become much stronger, and her smashes have improved too. I definitely have a lot of work to do against her. And I have to thank god for my win, I managed to get back into a safe zone after that", said Saina.
The year 2015 is significant in her career, according to the 24 year old. Rankings, she says, are not on her mind right now. In fact, it's the preparations for next year's Rio Olympics that Saina wants to focus on. "There are certain strategies I am working on, preparing for Rio, but I would like to keep that a secret", she said.
Syed Modi Masters: Saina Nehwal, PV Sindhu Advance
Lucknow: Saina Nehwal and P.V. Sindhu entered the women's singles' second round, while Kidambi Srikanth and Parupalli Kashyap reached the third round of the $120,000 Syed Modi International India Masters at the Babu Banarasi Das Indoor Stadium here Wednesday.
World No.4 and top seed Saina defeated Malaysian Yin Fun Lim 21-17, 21-12 in 43 minutes, while World No.11 Sindhu needed just 16 minutes to demolish compatriot Ekta Kalia 21-6, 21-12.
In the next match, Olympic bronze medal winner Saina will meet Rituparna Das, who battled past compatriot's qualifier Mukherjee Riya 21-7, 21-16. Two-time World Champions bronze medallist Sindhu will Thursday face Thailand's Chochuwong Pornpawee, who beat Indian Saili Rane 21-23, 21-15, 21-8.
Reigning world champion Carolina Marin of Spain also had it easy win over Gadde Ruthvika Shivani 21-9, 21-10 in 28 minutes, while Thai fourth seed Nichaon Jindapon advanced after Indian qualifier Yamini Sharma retired hurt. World No.19 Jindapon was leading the game 21-4, 9-0 when Yamini decided not to continue.
In the men's section, World No.4 Srikanth first beat Shreyansh Jaiswal 21-14, 21-13 before defeating Malaysian Kian Meng Tan 18-21, 21-13, 22-20 in the second round.
Commonwealth Games champion Kashyap fend off challenges from Subhanker Dey and Ankit Chikara. While Dey lost 11-21, 20-22, Ankit was outplayed 7-21, 14-21.
Other Indians in the fray, H.S. Prannoy, R.M.V. Gurusaidutt, Arvind Bhatt, B. Sai Praneeth and Sourabh Verma also entered the third round.
Sameer Verma and Ajay Jayaram crossed the first round but suffered defeats in the second round on the same day.
Zulfadli Zulkiffli, Viktor Axelsen and Vladimir Ivanov also moved into third round.
The men's singles competition had 64 players, while the women's singles event had 32 competitors.
The Indian women's doubles pairs of Jwala Gutta and Ashwini Ponnappa and Pradnya Gadre and N. Sikki Reddy got byes in the first round.
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