Indian duo of Sanave Thomas and Rupesh Kumar registered a fine win over the Swiss pair of Philippe Gabella and Raphael Lienhard to reach the quarterfinals of the BWF World Senior Badminton Championships 2017 at the Rajiv Gandhi Indoor Stadium in Kochi on Thursday.
The top seeded Indian pair, favourites to lift the men’s doubles title in the 35-plus age category defeated the Swiss pair 21-7, 21-10 to stay on course for their maiden Masters title.
They will meet the Danish pair of Lars Klintrup and Morten Rasmussen in the last eight stage.
Late on day three, CM Shashidhar pulled off a major upset in the 40-plus men’s singles category when he defeated top-seed Lars Klintrup from Denmark 21-8, 21-11. He will face Thaweesak Koetsriphan [5/8] in the quarter-final.
Second seeded Indian pair of V.Diju and J.B.S Vidhyadhar also kept their hopes alive as they got past the English-Japanese pair of Rudy Sototo and Ryo Tazo 21-11, 21-11 to qualify for the quarterfinals in the 35-plus age category. They will play the Japanese pair of Masaharu Okawara and Kyohei Sato in the next round encounter.
In the 55-plus men’s singles category, one of the tournament favourites Harjit Singh made a comeback to register a hard fought victory 14-21, 21-12, 21-9 over Fred Fiebeg of Germany to book a spot in the quarterfinals. He will take on Bengt Mellquist of Sweden in his next match.
Basant Kumar Soni also advanced to the quarterfinals in 55-plus men’s singles competition with a commanding 21-3, 21-8 victory over Wiwat Traisilpwissarut of Thailand. He will face Heinz Josef Roesch of Germany in the last eight encounter.
Vijay Sharma inched a step closer to the podium as he pulled off an upset victory over 5-8 seed Justin Andrews of England 21-16, 21-15 to qualify for the last eight. He will be up against Ulf Svensson of Sweden in the next round.
