As predicted, only Nguyen Tien Minh of Viet Nam has entered the next round of the Yonex Sunrise Badminton Asia Championship, which is ongoing in New Dehli, India.

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Nguyen Tien Minh.

Minh is now the country’s sole representative in the singles event after his teammates dropped out yesterday, April 14.

The Vietnamese top player beat China’s Kai Wen 21-19, 21-18 in a match that was harder than expected, as his rival was an unknown force. He created a lot of obstacles to Minh before losing in 40 minutes. Earlier, the two-time Olympian quickly defeated Shao Wen Hsu of Chinese Taipei 21-7, 21-8.

Minh, the world No 7 and seed No 4 here, will play Muhammad Hafiz Hashim of Malaysia in the third round today. It will be the third meeting of the two sides and the victory can belong to either Minh or Hashim, the tournament’s No 10, as both pocketed one win and one loss from each other last year.

Hashim yesterday won 21-11, 19-21, 21-11 over Ho Jin-choi of South Korea.

Viet Nam sent a big team to compete at the continental competition, but most of them have already failed out.

Young talent Le Ha Anh survived after the first round, beating Umer Zeeshan of Pakistan 21-16, 19-21, 21-15 in the men’s singles. But he could not go further in the second round, where he lost 10-21, 16-21 to former Olympic champion Taufik Hidayat of Indonesia, the No 1 seed here at the tournament.

Earlier, teammate Nguyen Hoang Nam was defeated 16-21, 10-21 by Kuan Beng Hong from Malaysia. Meanwhile, Nguyen Hoang Hai was stopped by No 12 Dionysius Hayon Rumbaka of Indonesia 21-9, 21-16.

On the women’s side, the only single representative who did not have to play a qualifying round, Le Ngoc Nguyen Nhung, also failed. She could not resist China’s Xin Liu, and Nhung lost 8-21, 15-21.

The second win for Viet Nam yesterday was from the mixed duo Duong Bao Duc and Thai Thi Hong Gam, who won 21-17, 21-17 over Huynh Nguyen Khang and Le Ngoc Nguyen Nhung in an all-Vietnamese game.

They’ll next meet today with a pair from Indonesia, Tontowi Ahmad and Greysia Polii. Today will also see five teams from Viet Nam compete in men’s and women’s doubles events.

The tournament, which offers a US$150,000 purse to the winners, is being held at the Siri Fort Badminton Stadium and will conclude on Sunday.

VietNamNet/Viet Nam News