Gopichand crashes out of Singapore Open

India's challenge in the $170,000 Singapore Open badminton championships came to an end on Thursday evening with the exit of Pulella Gopichand and Nikhil Kanetkar in the pre-quarter-finals.

Former All-England champion Gopichand, who had breezed through to the pre-quarter-finals the morning session with an easy 15-3, 15-13 victory over Hong Kong's Wei Ng, was surprised by Singapore's Ronald Susilo. He went down 8-15, 12-15.

The unseeded former All England champion, who upset third seeded Lin Dan of China in the first round on Wednesday, had made the pre-quarters along with countryman Nikhil Kanetkar.

Kanetkar staged a superb rally after losing the first game to prevail over Sony Dwi Kunkoro of Thailand 10-15, 15-11, 17-16 in the second round, but surprisingly went down to Malaysia's James Chua 11-15, 8-15.

Another Indian to bite the dust was Chetan Anand, who went down to Malaysia's Ramesh Nathan 15-10, 15-5 in the second round.

Earlier report
Gopichand too good for Lin Dan