Denmark Open: Super Saina Nehwal scales the Chinese Wall

World No 4 and third seed Saina Nehwal entered the final of Denmark Open Super Series tournament in Odense with her first ever victory over world No 1 and London Olympics silver medallist Yihan Wang of China on Saturday.

The 22-year-old Saina was leading 21-12 12-7 in the women’s singles semifinal when the Chinese retired due to a knee injury. This was the seventh head-to-head clash between the two with the Chinese having won all the six matches previously, the last one being the semifinal of the London Games.

Saina will meet Juliane  Schenk in Sunday’s final. The sixth seeded German defeated another Chinese, Yanjiao Jiang, 13-21 21-14 21-15 in the first semifinal. Saina had entered the semifinal with a 21-10, 21-11 hammering of local favourite Tine Baun in a 33-minute quarterfinal on Friday night.

Saina, playing the last match of the day, took only 14 minutes to win the first set and was on the court for another 16 minutes before the injury forced Wang to retire.

Saina’s coach Pullela Gopichand, who stayed back in Hyderabad, was pleased with her ward’s progress.

“Saina has done well in the tournament overall. If you look at the first four results,  she has been very good,” Gopichand told DNA. “It was a little unfortunate that Yihan Wang did not finish her match. But the way Saina has been playing, she was very good.”

There were doubts about Saina going the distance in this tournament and if she has fully recovered from the knee injury that was bothering her since the Olympics. Gopichand said: “She looked a little rusty in the first round. But overall, she has come back and done very well.”

It was yet another withdrawal due to injury by a Chinese in a game that Saina was involved in. In the Olympic bronze-medal play-off, Xin Wang pulled out due to knee injury, giving India the first badminton medal from the quadrennial Games.

Gopichand said that Saina’s confidence has been high after her recent victories against the Chinese. “Each victory against the Chinese will give her more confidence,” he said, adding that Saina has the edge over Schenk in the final.

“May be Schenk has not had great results in the early part of this year, but going by her performances in the Denmark Open, it will be a good final. She has beaten good players. I feel Saina has the edge,” Gopichand said.

In the eight matches Schenk and Saina have played each other previously, the Indian has won five of them. However, the last time the two met was in the Japan Open 2011 when the Indian went down 19-21 10-21.

Results: Semifinals: Women’s singles: 3-Saina Nehwal (IND) bt 1-Yihan Wang (CHN) 21-12 12-7 Retired, 6-Juliane Schenk (GER) bt 8-Yanjiao Jiang (CHN) 13-21 21-14 21-15; Men’s singles:  1-Lee Chong Wei (MAS) bt Jan O Jorgensen (DEN) 22-20 21-15, 7-Pengyu Du (CHN) bt 2-Chen Long 21-14 21-10; Quarterfinals: Women’s singles: 3-Saina Nehwal (IND) bt 5-Tine Baun (DEN) 21-10 21-11