India badminton star Saina Nehwal knocked out Olympic champion Carolina Marin of Spain in the opening round of women’s singles competition in the Denmark Open in Odense on Wednesday. Saina Nehwal glows the shine of the country after the mind-blowing performance.

Saina, who won a bronze in the Glasgow World Championship, defeated Marin 22-20 in the first round, 21-18 in a hard-fought battle. She will play either Thailand’s Nitchaon Jindapol or Russia’s Evgeniya Kosetskaya in the next round. Other Indians Kidambi Srikanth and H S Prannoy made positive starts to the tournament but B Sai Praneeth crashed out in the opening round of men’s singles.

World number eight Srikanth overcame a forceful challenge from national qualifier Subhankar Dey, who played for Grove team in the Danish league this year, 21-17-21-15 to set up a clash with Korean Jeon Hyeok Jin, the 2016 Australian Open runners-up. On the adjacent court, Praneeth lost 10-21, 15-21 to Hans-Kristian Solberg Vittinghus in a lop-sided contest. Earlier, world number 15 Prannoy recovered from a 6-11 deficit in the second game to oust Denmark’s Emil Holst 21-18, 21-19 in a hard-fought match. It was his third win over the Danish shuttler. The Indian is likely to play former World No. 1 Malaysian Lee Chong Wei tomorrow.

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