Kochi: The Indian duo of Sanave Thomas and Rupesh Kumar registered a scintillating victory over the Swiss pair of Philippe Gabella and Raphael Lienhard to cruise into the quarter-finals of the BWF World Senior Badminton Championships 2017 at the Rajiv Gandhi Indoor Stadium here on Thursday.
The top seeded Indian pair, touted as firm favourites to lift the men’s double title in the +35 age category made short work of the Swiss pair 21-7, 21-10 to stay on course for their maiden Masters title.
They will meet the Danish pair of Lars Klintrup and Morten Rasmussen in the last eight stage.
Second seeded Indian pair of V.Diju and J.B.S Vidhyadhar also kept their hopes alive as they got past the English-Japanese pair of Rudy Sototo and Ryo Tazo 21-11, 21-11 to qualify for the quarter-finals in the +35 age category.
They will play the Japanese pair of Masaharu Okawara and Kyohei Sato in the next round.
In the +55 men’s singles category, one of the tournament favourites Harjit Singh made a stunning comeback to register a hard fought 14-21, 21-12, 21-9 victory over Fred Fiebeg of Germany to book a spot in the quarter-finals. He will take on Bengt Mellquist of Sweden in his next match.
Basant Kumar Soni also advanced to the quarter-finals in +55 men’s singles competition with a commanding 21-3, 21-8 victory over Wiwat Traisilpwissarut of Thailand. He will face Heinz Josef Roesch of Germany in the last eight stage.
