India’s challenge at the 2019 Korea Masters ended after Kidambi Srikanth and Sameer Verma bowed out in the second round of the Gwangju event on Thursday.
Srikanth lost to Japan’s Kanta Tsuneyama 21-14 21-19 in 37 minutes while Verma was beaten by South Korea’s Kim Donghun 21-19 21-12.
The Korean, ranked 112th in the world, had knocked out Sourabh Verma in the earlier round in three games to set up an encounter with his brother Sameer who had sealed his place into the next round after his Japanese opponent Kazumasa Sakai retired during the first game.
In the first round, Srikanth has eased to win over Wing Ki Vincent Wong of Hong Kong but couldn’t keep up the same level of performance in the second round as his disappointing run continued in Korea.
