2021 Hylo Open | Ashwini Ponappa and N Sikki Reddy duo advance to the second round

11/03/2021

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India’s Laksya Sen defeated France’s Thomas Rouxel 21-17, 21-14 in the opening round 2021 Hylo Open, in Saarbrucken, Germany on Tuesday. On the other hand, the women’s doubles pair of Ashwini Ponappa and N Sikki Reddy also scripted a comfortable victory in their opening match of the meet.

After a hot and cold show at the recently concluded 2021 French Open, the Indian shuttlers is handed another opportunity to make amends in the 2021 Hylo Open, which began on Tuesday. Among the Indians who featured on Day 1 of the meet, only few tasted success, while the rest failed to cross the first hurdle.

Lakshya Sen, the champion of this tournament in the 2019 edition, defeated France’s Thomas Rouxel 21-17, 21-14 to progress to the following round. The shuttler lost in the quarter-final of the 2021 French Open last week.

Meanwhile, the women’s pair of Ashwini Ponappa and N Sikki Reddy, the seventh seeds, had the better of Ukraine’s Mariia Stoliarenko and Yelyzaveta Zharka 21-8, 21-13. Apart from the above two results, all went against India’s favour.

In the mixed doubles event, the pair of Ashwini Ponnappa and B Sumeeth Reddy lost 21-12, 21-13 to the Danish pair of Niclas Nohr and Amalie Magelund. On the other hand, Maria Ulitina lost convincingly defeated India’s Sri Krishna Priya Kudaravalli in the women’s singles event.

The men’s doubles pair of B Sumeeth Reddy and Manu Attri lost 21-9, 21-11 to sixth-seeded English pair of Ben Lane and Sean Vendy, while the duo of Tarun Kona and Shivam Sharma lost 21-16, 21-18 to Daniel Lundgaard and Mathias Thyrri of Denmark.

Ajay Jayram, ranked 63rd in the world put up a spirited fight against Denmark’s world no. 13 Rasmus Gemke, but eventually lost the match 4-21, 21-19, 16-21 in the opening round of the men’s singles event.

Former world no. 1 Kidambi Srikanth and former winner of the 2018 Hylo Open Subhankar Dey will begin their respective campaigns, on Wednesday.