Korea Open 2022, Day 1: Lakshya Sen, Malvika Bansod advance; Prannoy exits

Indian shuttlers got off to a rocky start at the Korea Open 2022 with Lakshya Sen, fresh from his silver run at the German Open and All England Open, surviving a scare against unseeded local favourite Ji Hoon Choi to progress to the next round.

Made to work hard in a 62-minute battle that went the full length, the sixth-seeded Lakshya Sen had to battle past Choi, 14-21, 21-16, 21-18 in an early thriller at the BWF Super 500 event. Sen will go on to meet Indonesia's Shesar Hiren Rhustavito for a place in the quarters.

In the other men's singles match, HS Prannoy suffered a shock exit in the first round and failed to make it to the pre-quarters, losing in straight games to Malaysia's Cheam June Wei, 21-17, 21-7 in a clash that lasted 41 minutes.

Meanwhile, in the Men's Doubles, the pair of Krishna Prasad Garaga/Vishnuvardhan Goud Panjala lost to the Indonesian duo of Pramudya Kusumawardana/Yeremia Rambitan in a close encounter of 31 minutes, 21-14, 21-19.

On the other hand, the pair of B.Sumeeth Reddy/Navaneeth Bokka also went down fighting to the sixth-seeded Malaysian pair of Ong Yew Sin and Teo Ee Yi, 21-14, 21-12 in 33 minutes.

Big win for Malvika Bansod

Meanwhile, the young Malvika Bansod registered a big win over China's Han Yue. The Indian lost the hard-fought first game 20-22 before fighting back to bag the match by winning the next two games 22-20, 21-10 in 56 minutes. Han Yue was crowned the Asian Junior Champion in 2017 and had won the silver in Junior World Championships in the same year.