Australian Open: Indian shuttlers fail to go past quarterfinals

Sydney: India's top-ranked singles player H S Prannoy went down to Kodai Naraoka of Japan 19-21, 13-21 as none among the country's shuttlers failed to progress beyond the quarterfinals of the Australian Open Super 500 event here on Friday.

World No. 10 Prannoy was the last Indian to be eliminated on a day when his compatriot Sameer Verma, mixed doubles pair of Sikki Reddy and B Sumeeth Reddy and Aakarshi Kashyap in women's singles also bowed out.

Prannoy made a rally from being 10-16 down to level the proceedings at 18-all before taking a one-point lead but Naraoka held his nerve to seal the first game.

Naraoka was far superior in the second game as he suddenly upped the ante at 5-5 without giving Prannoy any scope of a comeback to seal the match in little more than an hour.

Fresh from his upset victory over former world No. 1 Loh Kean Yew, Verma was no match for his world No. 17 Chinese Taipei's Lin Chun-Yi who cruised to a 21-12, 21-13 win in 38 minutes.

In the mixed doubles, eighth-seeded husband-wife duo of Summeth and Sikki also faced a tough opposition in top-seeded pair of Jian Zhen Bang and Wei Ya Xin, who took just about half-an-hour's time to secure an easy 21-12, 21-14 victory.

Eighth seed Aakarshi went down to Chinese Taipei's Yu Po Pai 21-17, 21-12 in a 42-minute women's singles contest.