Paris: In Paris to clinch the world no. 1 spot, India's ace shuttler and currently world no. 2 Saina Nehwal shared her experience after winning the Round-3 match of the World Badminton Championship against Russia's Ella Diehl here on Thursday.
Talking to the media, Saina compared Thursday's match with the one she played against Diehl in Indonesia.
"Last time when I played her in Indonesia, she was good. But today it was okay. Instead, I was leading 16-11 in the third set and I made few errors but I think overall it was quite an easy game.
"She is a rally player again. Basically, lot of half smashes and drop shots and I was quite ready for that," analysed Saina.
She also pointed out the changes she had to bring in to beat the Russian: "I had to change my game also but I didn't see any kind of difference but she was playing more down-the-line pushes at the forehand side. That was a little bit different."
Though Saina did admit to feeling a bit of pressure, owing to a quarterfinal berth at stake, she said she is getting used to that.
"That’s okay. I have been playing from last 5-6 years. So every round is tough and I had the pressure obviously that next round will be quarterfinal, which I think was the target for today. Last time it was quite tough with her. So this time I think I played quite well," said the world no. 2.
When quizzed about her comfort level having played on successive days, Saina said she felt a bit better on Thursday. "I felt good today. Yesterday was the first match. So little tough adjusting on the court but today was very good," she said.
It's difficult to find support playing in Europe but Saina was satisfied with the cheers she received. "There were 3-4 people cheering for me but other people were also cheering. It was good support."
The second seeded Indian made short work of 13th seed Diehl, beating her 21-14, 21-18 in the third round of the women's singles event. Saina will take on either 11th seed Jie Yao of the Netherlands or sixth seed Shixian Wang from China on Friday.
Comments
0 comment