India's Mithun Manjunath enters final of Orleans Masters

Orleans (France), April 3 (IANS) Indian shuttler Mithun Manjunath progressed to the final of the Orleans Masters 2022 men's singles event after beating Indonesia's Christian Adinata, here.Mithun, ranked world No 79, overcame his 189th-ranked opponent 21-18, 21-14 in the semifinals of the BWF Super 100 event at the Palais des Sports on Saturday night.Both players began on equal footing as the first game ebbed and flowed till the scores were tied 16-all. Mithun then snatched five of the next seven points to go 1-0 up in the match. The second game began similarly but the Indian, who went into the break leading 11-9, strengthened his grip on the contest and sealed the match in 47 minutes.In the round of 16, the 23-year-old Manjunath defeated world No 22 Hans-Kristian Solberg Vittinghus of Denmark to emerge as India's best hope after top seed B Sai Praneeth's early exit.Mithun Manjunath will face world No 32 and former European junior champion Toma Junior Popov of France in the summit clash on Sunday.In the women's doubles semis, the Indian pair of Ashwini Bhat K and Shikha Gautam stretched Germany's Stine Kuspert and Emma Moszczynski to three games but eventually went down 16-21, 21-18, 22-24.
--IANS avn/inj

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