Saina off to victorious start in world championship, but all is not well on fitness front
Sainau00a0off to victorious start in world championship, but all is not well on fitness front
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It took just 26 minutes for Saina Nehwal India's greatest hope at the 2009 World Badminton Championships to defeat Anastasia Prokopenko yesterday.
The 21-10, 21-17 victory by the sixth seeded Indian ace shows that she has seemingly recovered from her chicken pox scare, but there still seem to be some chinks in her armour that have to be rectified by her coach Pullela Gopichand.
Saina's strong attack on Prokopenko's forehand side and also the flat smashes on right side of the Russian's body was a gameplan that the Indian persisted with right through that game. She had early leads of 5-1/10-6 to build upon from the start as a shaky Russian tried to find space from where to counter.
But from 15-8 onwards Saina never allowed Anastasia to have a look into the game and raced away to a 21-10 win in 12 minutes. The sudden crosscourt smashes on Prokopenko's forehand from difficult angles were a treat to watch. Saina's ability to hit these and immediately position herself for possible returns is a quality that could see her reach the top three by this year-end.
The opponents from now on will not be that easy and the Indian will not only have to show supreme fitness, but any areas of vulnerability, like the forehand net area will be exploited by experienced opponents. There were several video cameras trained on the Indian's match and coaches could be studying her game.
There are other concerns too. A close family source says that she is still experiencing back problems.
"I am not really happy with the outcome. It was an okay match. My second round opponent (Bulgarian Petya Nedelcheva) will not be easy. I did beat her in the Indonesian Open, but then everyone has trained their best for this event. Let's see what happens tomorrow," she said.
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