Indian shuttlers continued to surge ahead in the French Open Super Series badminton here as Saina Nehwal made it to the women’s singles third round while Ashwini Ponappa also won her second-round match with mixed doubles partner Vladimir Ivanov here on Thursday.
Fifth seed Saina was made to work hard by Kirsty Gilmour of Scotland during her 21-19, 21-16 win. Saina, who took just 37 minutes to outplay local girl Sashina Vignes Wara in the opening round, outplayed Kirsty in 39 minutes.
In mixed doubles, the pair of Ashwini and Ivanov got past China’s seventh seeds Lu Kai and Huang Yaqiong 21-8, 18-21, 21-9 in the second round. Ashwini and Ivanov had defeated Keigo Sonoda and Shizuka Matsuo of Japan in the first round.
Earlier, Commonwealth Games gold medallist P. Kashyap stunned World No. 4 Kenichi Tago of Japan 21-11, 21-18 in men’s singles first round on Wednesday.
However, it was curtains for H.S. Prannoy and Sourabh Varma, both of whom failed to cross the opening round, going down to Japan’s Kento Momota and England’s Rajiv Ouseph, respectively.
