Parupalli Kashyap topples Tien Minh Nguyen in pre quarter-final round – China Open Update
India’s talented shuttler Parupalli Kashyap earned the right to be in the quarter-finals of Li Ning China Open by delivering a stunner in the second round on Thursday, November 15, 2012.
He smacked down the World Number 11 Tien Minh Nguyen in a 68-minute battle which took place in Shanghai.
Both contenders challenged each other in all areas of the game and kept the audience intact while piling up final figures of 12-21, 22-20 and 21-14.
Kashyap, who was underrated earlier in this Super Series, proved his worth despite losing the opening game in this match.
On the other hand, the Vietnamese campaigner failed to employ all of his brilliance and crashed out in a woeful manner.
Tien Minh looked in prime touch in the first set as he finished this crucial game with a significant difference of nine points.
He started the beating from very first stroke and put his challenger under huge pressure by piling up a decent total of 7-2.
He gathered valuable points at steady pace and maintained the upper hand until 11-5 score before the interval.
After the mid-game break, Tien Minh lost focus for short span of time and allowed Kashyap to narrow the gap.
However, he reinstated his supremacy with couple of productive rallies and ended the opening game with an overwhelming margin of 21-12.
The Indian youngster did not lose his nerve after this severe blow and turned his rival’s plan of a straight-set victory into dust.
This time Kashyap displayed commendable fighting spirit and tipped the scale in his favour. He was bit sluggish in the beginning as couple of establishing rallies saw him dropping valuable points in a row.
He started making progress after 7-9 and made a notable difference with seven successive points. He carried this momentum all the way to game point situation and won this second set with 22-20 score.
Third set turned into a dead contest after the one-minute intervals as Kashyap completely dominated the overall pace of rallies and cruised to quarter-final round with an impressive margin of 21-14.
His next challenge will be to surpass Zhengming Wang to surge into the semi-finals of 2012 China Open.
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