Basel: World Number Two and top seed, Saina Nehwal crashed out of the Swiss Open Grand Prix Gold after losing her semi-final match to Wang Shixian of China 21-11, 10-21, 21-9 .
Saina showed the spirits but wasn’t at her best and lost the game in three sets. Wang started the game well and took a comprehensive lead of 8-0 in the first five minute of the game. Saina had a slow start and she got bogged down in the first set by 11-21. Wang didn’t give Saina much of a breathing space in the first set.
Wang got four consecutive points but Saina made an impressive comeback to win the second set and her aggressive intent was the key factor in winning this set. She went head for the first time in the entire match in the second game 8-7. From there on, Saina amassed points to narrow the gap until she took the second game 21-10.
Saina, who had got the better of the fourth seed Chinese in previous encounters, was just having a bad day at the court and with slight niggle on her right knee it was getting tough.
She couldn’t keep fighting for long time and lost the final set by 9-21 in 50th minute of the game and crashed out of the semi-finals. She wasn’t able to cover much of a court and was not able to answer some easy smashes. From a competitive 6-5, Wang sprinted to 17-5 in no time and ended the prolific run of Saina at Swiss open.
Wang Shixian will now take on Ratchanok Intanon of Thailand in the final.