Ace shuttler Parupalli Kashyap suffered Injury midway through the qualifying round match and withdrew from the competition while 2022 World Junior Championships silver medalist, Sankar Muthusamy, made the it to the main draw of the US Open badminton tournament, winning both his qualifying round matches at Council Bluffs, Iowa.
The former world No. 6 Indian defeated world No. 159 Rohan Midha of Canada 21-19, 21-17 in his first match of the qualifiers but had to pull out of the mid-game against world No. 85 Koo Takahashi of Japan.
Kashyap, a 2014 Commonwealth Games men’s singles champion, had lost the first game against Takahashi 21-23 and was trailing 7-11 at the time of his withdrawal.
Meanwhile The 19-year-old Muthusamy, 80th in men’s singles badminton rankings, registered a 21-17, 21-11 win over world No. 155 Davi Silva of Brazil in the first round. He then got better of world No. 139 BR Sankeerth of Canada with a 21-11, 21-17 win to march into the main draw.
Muthusamy will face world No. 32 Nhat Nguyen of Ireland in the main draw of the BWF Super 300- event .
India’s only challenge in men’s doubles, Krishna Prasad Garaga and Vishnuvardhan Goud Panjala crashed out in the round of 32. The Indians ranked 37th in doubles, lost to world No. 59 pair of Lin Yu Chieh and Su Li Wei of Chinese Taipei 21-14, 21-14.
In women’s doubles, Apeksha Nayak and Ramya Chickmenhalli Venkatesh, world No. 192, withdrew from the tournament before their round of 32 match against Jeslyn Chow and Eliana Zhang of Canada.
Two-time Olympic medalist PV Sindhu and Commonwealth Games 2022 champion Lakshya Sen, will be seen in action in the main draw.