Basel: The day one of the Badminton World Federation (BWF) Swiss Open, a Super 300 event, kicked off on Tuesday with the mixed doubles event, and saw very few surprises as most of the seeded pairs advanced in Basel.
The top-seeded Chan Peng Soon/Goh Liu Ying of Malaysia were forced to work hard to stave off unseeded Nipitphon Phuangphuapet/Benyapa Aimsaard of Thailand 21-15, 15-21, 21-19 in 53 minutes.
Chan/Goh will play Ronan Labar/Anne Tran of France in the second round. The French pair defeated another Malaysian pair, Hoo Pang Ron/Cheah Yee See 21-19, 21-17 on Tuesday.
Malaysia’s No. 4 seeds Goh Soon Huat/Shevon Jemie Lai also made the second round after a straight games victory over Eloi Adam/Margot Lambert of France 21-18, 21-14 to meet Rasmus Espersen/Christine Busch of Denmark next.
Tan Kian Meng/Lai Pei Jing who left the Badminton Association of Malaysia (BAM) in mid-February, defeated Adnan Maulana/Mychelle Crhystine Bandaso of Indonesia 21-13, 21-12 to play Jones Ralfy Jansen/Kilasu Ostermeyer of Germany next.
In addition to Hoo/Cheah who were playing under BAM but got knocked out in the first round, another BAM mixed doubles pair, Chen Tang Jie/Peck Yen Wei also bowed out to No. 6 seeds Thom Gicquel/Delphine Delrue of France 12-21, 17-21.
The biggest upset of the day was created by unseeded Satwiksairaj Rankireddy/Ashwini Ponnappa of India as they shocked No. 2 seeds Hafiz Faizal/Gloria Emanuelle Widjaja of Indonesia 18-21, 10-21.
