In the second game, Saina again moved to a 5-2 lead first and kept distancing herself from Kim, who tried to stay close to the Indian. But Saina was too tough for the Korean as she moved to 18-10 and then sealed the contest comfortably
India's star shuttler Saina Nehwal
Saina Nehwal emerged as the lone Indian survivor at the USD 600,000 Korea Open after reaching the prequarterfinals with a straight-game win over Korea's Kim Hyo Min at the BWF World Tour Super 500 tournament here Wednesday.
The former world no 1 Indian, who won a Commonwealth Games gold and a bronze at the 18th Asian Games this year, defeated Kim Hyo Min 21-12 21-11 in a lop-sided opening round contest. The fifth seeded Indian will face a local qualifier Kim Ga Eun next. However, it was curtains for Swiss Open champion Sameer Verma and rising shuttler Vaishnavi Reddy Jakka.
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While Sameer, who had secured the Hyderabad Open title early this week, ran out of steam against Denmark's Anders Antonsen, going down 21-15 16-21 7-21 in a men's singles match, young Vaishnavi was ousted 10-21 9-21 by sixth seed Beiwen Zhang of USA.
Saina didn't face much competition from her first-round opponent as she opened up a 6-2 lead early on and then jumped to a 12-3 advantage before slowly and steadily moving ahead to pocket the first game.
In the second game, Saina again moved to a 5-2 lead first and kept distancing herself from Kim, who tried to stay close to the Indian. But Saina was too tough for the Korean as she moved to 18-10 and then sealed the contest comfortably.
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