Tamil Nadu men storm into the final

TN wins 3-0 in men's semis of 77th South Zone Inter-State badminton championship. Hariharan/Ruban Kumar, Sreya Balaji/Srinidhi, and K. Sathish Kumar all victorious. TN to face Karnataka in final.

Tamil Nadu did not sweat much on its way to a 3-0 win over Andhra Pradesh in the men’s team semifinals of the 77th South Zone Inter-State badminton championship at the RAK’s Badminton Academy courts here on Friday.

K. Sathish Kumar gave the host State a winning start defeating K. Sai Charan 21-6, 21-12 in less than half hour. Siddhanth Gupta made it doubly sweet with a 21-13, 21-8 win over Venkata Sai Himadeep. Later, Hariharan and Ruban Kumar combined well to beat Chandra Gopinath and Sai Pavan 21-9, 21-9 and steer the team into the final.

Tamil Nadu will now take on favourite Karnataka, which scored a similar win over Kerala.

Earlier, N. Srinidhi and Sreya Balaji bounced back from a set down to defeat Anaga Pai and V. Sreyanshi of Telangana 19-21, 21-18, 21-15 in the deciding doubles clash to seal Tamil Nadu women a place in the last four.

The team lost a bit of hope when the duo narrowly lost the first set. That’s because they found it a bit too hard to control the shuttle. But, midway through, both Sreya and Srinidhi, who is recovering from an ankle injury, showed great understanding and kept their cool under pressure to pull off a stunning 3-2 win.

The results:

Men: Semifinals: Tamil Nadu bt Andhra Pradesh 3-0; Karnataka bt Kerala 3-0. Quarterfinals: Puducherry lost to Kerala 0-3; Telangana lost to TN 1-3.