Pawar in main draw of Indonesian Open

Olympian Anup Sridhar's challenge fizzled out but Anand Pawar survived a stiff one to emerge the lone Indian qualifier to reach the main draw at the Indonesian Open Super Series badminton tournament in Jakarta on Tuesday.

Sridhar, who beat world No 2 Peter Gade of Denmark in the pre-quarter-finals of the Singapore Open Super Series last week, failed to recreate the same form and crashed out following a 21-23, 21-12, 11-21 defeat against Thai Tanongsak Saensomboonsuk in 48 minutes in his second round match.

In his first round he had beaten Canadian Stephan Wojcikiewicz 21-7, 21-10 in 18 minutes.

However, compatriot Pawar put up a good show and beat fellow-Indian Ajay Jayaram 21-18, 21-18 in a 32-minute battle to set up a fight with fourth seed local player Sony Dwi Kuncoro in the first round of the main draw on Wednesday.

Earlier, Pawar was declared the winner in his first match when England's Carl Baxter retired just after six minutes with the score reading 17-4.

Jayaram had defeated Dane Christian Lind Thomsen 21-11, 21-19 in 32 minutes.

India's V Diju, who paired with German Tim Dettmann, also crashed out after losing his second round match 21-14, 15-21, 26-24 to the Korean pair of Ki Jung Kimim and Yi Goo Kwon.

Meanwhile, ace shuttler Saina Nehwal will look to maintain her steady form and Chetan Anand will have to put behind the disappointment of a first round exit in the Singapore Open last week as India formally starts its campaign on Wednesday.

World number seven Saina, who reached the quarter-finals of the Singapore Open last week, will start her campaign against Bulgarian Petya Nedelcheva.

Aditi Mutatkar will meet Nicole Grether of Germany in her opening tie in the other women's singles match.

In the men's singles, Chetan will have a tough task at hand against seventh seed Dane Joachim Persson and Arvind Bhat will face Yu Hsing Hsieh of Chinese Taipei.

Meanwhile, P Kashyap, who is in red hot form, will have to emulate Sridhar when he locks horns with Dane Peter Gade in his opening match.

India's mixed doubles pair of V Diju and Jwala Gutta will cross swords with Malaysian duo Kien Keat Koo and Hui Lin Ng, while men's doubles pair of Rupesh Kumar and Sanave Thomas will have American pair of Howard Bach and Tony Gunawan as their rivals in their opener.

Also, Indian new women's doubles pair of Jwala Gutta and Ashwini Ponnappa will face Mona Santoso and Cynthia Tuwankotta in their first match.