Indian badminton ace Saina Nehwal suffered a shock defeat in the Singapore Super Series, losing to Indonesia's Lindaweni Fanetri in the women's singles quarter-finals, on Friday.
The world No 2 squandered a one-game lead and went down to the unseeded Indonesian 21-17, 13-21, 13-21 in 58 minutes at the Singapore indoor stadium.
Earlier this month, Saina had beaten Fanetri 17-21, 29-27, 13-21 in the first round of the Indonesian Super Series Premier in Jakarta.
It was a neck-and-neck battle till the first 10 points of the opening game before Saina took a three-point lead to go up 14-11. She increased it to 17-13 before Fanetri clawed her way back and reduced the margin to just one point at 18-17.
The Indian, however, regained composure and pocketed three straight points to close the game.
The Indonesian started the second game on a bright note and opened up a 7-4 lead.
Riding on her smashes and delicate net play, she increased the lead to 19-10 before sealing the game and leveling the match scores.
Winning the second game gave her immense confidence of registering an upset victory over a higher-ranked opponent and she carried on the good form in the decider to open up a 12-3 lead over Saina with clear winners.
Hard as she tried, the Indian was not allowed any leeway for a recovery as Fanetri increased the lead to 19-9 before delivering the knock-out punch to avenge the defeat at the Jakarta event.
In other women's quarter-final matches Xuerui Li beat Sapsiree Taerattanachai 21-11, 21-19; Sun Yu beat Tzu-Ying Tai 21-17, 21-11; Yihan Wang beat Shixian Wang 21-15, 21-11.
Image: Lindaweni Fanetri
Photograph: Bazuki Muhammad/Reuters
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