Saina Nehwal dumped out of Hong Kong Open by Tai Tzu-ying

Saina Nehwal’s hopes of winning her third Superseries title of the year were ended after an upset by sixth seed Tai Tzu-ying in the quarter-finals at the Coliseum in Hung Hom on Friday.

The Indian third seed, who won last week’s China Open and the Australian Open in August, found it too difficult to move her tired legs against the Taiwan number one, losing in straight sets 21-15, 21-19 in the women’s singles.

“I was a bit tired after the China Open and although I gave my best today, I could not offer more,” said the Indian.

Nehwal is the only non-Chinese player to clinch a Superseries title this year. The world number four disagreed that the Chinese women are more vulnerable than before after both their number one and two seeds crashed out of the US$350,000 tournament in Hong Kong and failed to reach the China Open final for the first time in 28 years last week.

“All players are feeling the fatigue after a busy year, including the Chinese women,” she said. “They are as strong as before and it’s never easy to beat them in any tournament.”

In the men’s singles, top seed Chen Long of China lived up to the expectations, winning both games against Takuma Ueda of Japan to reach the semi-finals.

“I like the Hong Kong event very much and whenever I come here, I want to bring the fans the best badminton, regardless I win or not,” he said.