Sindhu, Saina to lead Indian challenge in Denmark Open badminton
Odense (Denmark), Oct 15 : Olympic medallists PV Sindhu and Saina Nehwal will lead a strong Indian challenge at the Denmark Open badminton tournament which gets underway here on Tuesday.
While Sindhu has been seeded third in the event, world no.11 Saina is unseeded here.
Sindhu will take on USA's Beiwen Zhang in the opening round of the women's singles. Saina, on the other hand, will be up against Cheung Ngan Yi of Hong Kong.
In men's singles competition, world no.6 Kidambi Srikanth will be India's best bet and has been seeded seventh in the tournament.
Srikanth will face Hans-Kristian Solberg Vittinghus of Denmark in the opening round, while B Sai Praneeth will play Huang Yuxiang of China.
However, it will be a difficult opening encounter for another Indian, Sameer Verma, as he will square off against third seed Shi Yuqi of China.
The other Indian in fray, HS Prannoy also faces a tough first round match as he will be up against sixth seed Son Wan Ho of Korea.
Commonwealth Games champion Parupalli Kashyap, who lost his passport at Amsterdam and sought the Indian government's help on Friday, however doesn't feature in the men's singles draw.
In men's doubles, the Indian pair of Manu Attri and B Sumeeth Reddy will take on local hope Kim Astrup and Anders Skaarup Rasmussen in the opening round.
Ashwini Ponappa and Satwiksairaj Rankireddy will face the Korean combination of Seo Seung Jae and Chae Yujung in the first round of the mixed doubles competition.
Ponappa will pair up with N Sikki Reddy and play the American duo of Ariel Lee and Sydney Lee in the opening round of the women's doubles event.
Let the Truth be known. If you read VB and like VB, please be a VB Supporter and Help us deliver the Truth to one and all.
Confident we are going to win Kerala: Shashi Tharoor
New Delhi (PTI): Congress leader Shashi Tharoor on Thursday expressed confidence in the victory of the United Democratic Front (UDF) in Kerala, saying the Congress-led alliance will win more than 75 seats out of the total 140 in the state.
Tharoor, who hails from Kerala, said he was not surprised to see the results of the exit polls, most of which predicted a victory for the UDF that has been out of power for 10 years in the state.
"We have been on the ground. I have campaigned in 59 constituencies across 12 districts out of 14. I was very confident we are going to win.
"Everything that I have picked up from not just my party colleagues and workers but also from other observers, media and others have always convinced me that we were going to score a comfortable win of above 75 seats. And all the (exit) polls have confirmed the same thing," he told reporters here.
The Thiruvananthapuram MP said he was not surprised to see the results of the exit polls but in general he was not a big fan of exit polls in India.
"Because ours is not purely a homogenous society. We have to take into account gender issue, caste issue, class issue, regional disparities. You never get a convincingly large enough sample to give an accurate poll and now there is the additional complication that we have heard about in West Bengal this year that many people are unwilling to answer the questions of the pollsters," he said.
The Congress leader said normally, it used to be below 10 per cent that people said that they would not answer.
"Even if you are a reputable exit pollster, in Bengal, one polling company has said 60 per cent of people refused to answer. So, what is the worth of a poll where 60 per cent of your respondents have not answered," he said.
Several exit polls on Wednesday predicted a comeback by the Congress-led UDF in Kerala after 10 years, dethroning the CPI(M)-led Left Democratic Front (LDF).
Polling for the 140-member Kerala assembly was held on April 9. Results of assembly elections in West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Assam, Puducherry, besides Kerala, will be announced on May 4.
