Hyderabad, August 10: India failed to exploit the home advantage as barring ace shuttler Chetan Anand none could advance to the second round on the first day of the World Badminton Championship here today.
The men’s doubles pair of Rupesh Kumar and Sanave Thomas, Aditi Mutatkar in women’s singles, and mixed doubles pair of Arun Vishnu and Aparna Balan crashed out the tournament in the first round itself.
Chetan was the lone Indian who shone on the first day by winning his men’s singles opener against Korean Ji Hoon Hong 21-8 21-16 in 32 minutes.
After a high of recent success at the Asian circuit, Rupesh-Sanave hit a low as they lost 13-21 21-23 to the 14th seed Japanese pair of Kenichi Hayakawa and Kenta Kazuno in just over half an hour match.
Aditi Mutatkar had a disappointing outing as she lost to world number 11 Juliane Schenk 8-21 12-21.
Arun and Aparna also succumbed to Japanese pair of Noriyasu Hirata and Shizuka Matsuo 14-21 20-22 in 29 minutes.
Meanwhile, top seed Malaysian Lee Chong Wei won his opener against Dieter Domke 21-14 21-10 in just 25 minutes, while Chinese fifth seed Lin beat Misha Zilberman 21-9 21-11.
However, Lin’s compatriot Bao Chunlai was handed a shock defeat by Dicky Palyama of Holland, while world number three Dane Peter Hoeg Gade beat Valeriy Atrashchenkov 21-11 21-16 in the tournament opener. .
—PTI