PBL: Chennai drub Bengaluru 5-0

Chennai Smashers bounced back from their opening match defeat with a thumping 5-0 victory over Bengaluru Blasters in the Vodafone Premier Badminton League (PBL) campaign here on Tuesday.

Parupalli Kashyap, who is coming after an injury lay-off, displayed his top game against Bengaluru’s Sourabh Verma to emerge winner 11-8, 11-5 to give Chennai the 1-0 lead.

“It was a great match. I did well to beat Sourabh. He is a great player, but the way I played today, I could have beaten anyone. From team’s point of view it was a great result, and will help us going forward in the league,” Kashyap said after the match.

In the women’s singles match, P.V. Sindhu won Chennai’s a ‘Trump Match’ over Cheung Yi 12-10, 11-6. With this win, Chennai Smashers went up 3-0 against Bengaluru.

Sindhu said: “This was a good game for me. Though I conceded a lead in both the game, I came back strong. I am happy to get my first win of the season. Against (Carolina) Marin too (on Sunday), I won the first game, but she bounced back wonderfully. In this match, I didn’t look to change much, but stick to my aggressive style of play,” Sindhu said after her win.

“It took me some time to get used to the format, but now everything seems to be under control. I am comfortable playing the 11-point format, and hopefully can win some more matches for my team,” she added.

By the end of the mixed doubles match, that featured Chris Adcock and Gabrielle Adcock for Chennai, and Ashwini Ponnappa and Yoo Yeon Seong for Bengaluru, the winners were decided. Adcock couple emerged victorious with a hard fought score of 11-6, 8-11, 15-14.

In the second men’s singles, Bengaluru finally managed to pull one back when 2016 Olympics bronze medallist Victor Axelsen overcame Tommy Sugiarto 11-7, 13-11.

In the last and inconsequential men’s doubles tie, Sung-Hyun Ko and Yoo Yeon S lost Bengaluru’s ‘Trump Match’ to Chris Adcock and Mads Peiler of Chennai 11-7, 7-11, 11-13. With this loss, Bengaluru also had their one point reduced, losing the tie 0-5.