Ronny sails to All England second round

Ronny sails to All England second round

JAKARTA (JP): Indonesian Ronny Agustinus cruised to the second round of the men's singles at the All England badminton championships on Wednesday, beating Kasper Oedum of Denmark 15-8, 17-14.

Indonesian team manager Agus Dwi Santoso said from the tournament location in Birmingham, England, that Johan Hadikusuma won by a walkover over Christian Erichsen of Guatemala in another men's singles match.

Agus also said that Indonesian mixed doubles pairs of Bambang Suprianto and Zelin Resiana and veterans Tri Kusharyanto and Minarti Timur reached the second round. However, he could not remember the scores or the opponents offhand.

Reuters reported that Malaysian Rashid Sidek, seeded 14, survived an early scare on the opening morning on Wednesday, fighting back to beat little-known Vladislav Druzchenko of Ukraine 8-15, 15-13, 15-4.

Sidek, a former Commonwealth Games champion and a finalist in the All England four years ago, struggled to assert himself before finally claiming his second round place in 68 minutes.

It was much easier going for seventh seed Fung Permadi of Taiwan, who beat Denmark's Peter Janum 15-4, 15-6 in only 25 minutes.

England's Colin Haughton, faced with the unenviable task of a first round meeting with top seed and defending champion Peter Gade of Denmark, was forced to default because of a knee injury.(ivy)

Results

Men's singles, first round Sidharth Jain (Ind) bt Ruud Kuijten (Bel) 9-15, 15-11, 15-9 George Rimarcdi (Swe) bt Mou-Chou Lee (Tpe) 11-15, 15-12, 15-5 Nikhil Kanetkar (Ind) bt Kasper Fangel (Den) 15-13, 15-2 14-Rashid Sidek (Mal) bt Vladislav Druzchenko (Ukr) 8-15, 15-13, 15-4 Ronny Agustinus (Ina) bt Kasper Oedum (Den) 15-8, 17-14 Johan Hadikusuma (Ina) bt Christian Erichsen (Gua) walkover Richard Vaughan (Wal) bt Peter Knowles (Gbr) walkover