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Rupesh-Thomas pair in New Zealand Open final

July 31, 2009 17:12 IST

The Indian pair of Rupesh Kumar and Sanave Thomas beat Malaysia's Teik Chai Gan and Bin Shen Tan to cruise into the men's doubles final in the New Zealand Open Grand Prix badminton tournament in Auckland on Friday.

The top seeded Indian duo took just 30 minutes for a 21-15, 21-14 victory in the semi-final.

The Indian pair, which also entered the final of last week's Australian Open Grand Prix, takes on the fourth seeded Japanese pair of Hirokatsu Hashimoto and Noriyasu Hirata, who beat second seeds Fernando Kurniawan and Lingga Lie of Indonesia 21-16, 17-21, 21-17 in the other semi-final.

However, it was curtains for the women's doubles combo of Aparna Balan and Shruti Kurian. The Australian Open runners-up lost 19-21, 15-21 to top seeds Tsz Ka Chan and Ying Suet Tse of Hong Kong in a 27-minute contest.

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