Pawar, Saina showcase class

Bangalore : Compared to the amazingly tight matches of the earlier rounds, the finals of the Union Bank All India junior ranking tournament were tame affairs. Anand Pawar and Saina Nehwal prevailed in the high-profile U-19 boys and girls finals, with a degree of ease over Sagar Chopda and Aditi Mutatkar. While that showed their domination of the junior categories, the tournament proved that junior badminton in the country is alive and kicking.

To begin with, the organisers received an overwhelming number of entries: around 1,240 entries from 650 players, bringing the total number of matches to over 1,000. The participation more than doubled this year, since the 2003 tournament had only 315 players. The event was held from June 25 to 30.

The tournament resembled a mela , with food stalls and bright multi-coloured banners at the venue. That atmosphere seemed to bring out the best in all the participants, but Pawar and Saina proved they were still some way ahead of the rest.

Anand Pawar, son of former international Uday, was barely troubled by Chopda in the final. So dominant was he that he won 19 points before Chopda could get on the scorecard.

The first game was won 15-0, as Anand's powerful smashes and Sagar's fumbles at the net kept the points ticking. Anand ran away with the next four points in the second game as Sagar desperately tried to keep abreast. He broke Anand by attacking his service, and finally won a point when Anand netted a dribble.

The score stayed at 4-1 as the service changed hands six times, and then Anand chalked up four more points before Sagar could manage another point. But Sagar was playing at the same pace in the second game as he had in the first, not forcing Anand into any doubt. Whatever he dished out was meat and drink to Anand, who continued merrily to a 15-0, 15-2 win.

Anand was possibly enjoying the fruits of his two-month long training camp in Indonesia , during April and May this year. He said the training wasn't very different from what he'd experienced in India , but it was “harder and more intense”.

The girls' U-19 final, played earlier, was more or less similar, and ended in a 11-2, 11-6 win for AP's Saina Nehwal over Maharashtra 's Aditi Mutatkar. Saina was leading 8-1 in the second set, and Aditi came up with a belated charge to inch close at 5-9.

It had taken her more than a game to settle in and get her length right, but when she did, she'd started to trouble Saina. She pinned the Andhra girl to the backcourt, kept the rallies long, and forced her into errors. From 8-1, Saina faltered momentarily as Aditi came to 5-9, but then, Saina managed to retrieve her service with a fierce drive at the net, and then won on the third match point.

The most entertaining final, however, was the Boys U-16, with Samrudha Rathod of Maharashtra holding off Srujan Nandaluri of Andhra in three games.

Srujan, a rather unorthodox player, has learnt his game on cement courts, coached by his father. Whatever his technical limitations, he has plenty of heart, as he demonstrated in the final.

Rathod, with his consistent and technically correct play, won a tight first game 15-13 and then led 9-2 in the second. But if the audience was expecting another one-sided match, they were in for a surprise. Srujan clawed back dramatically, throwing himself all over the place like a Boris Becker, and equalled at 10-all. From there, it was a nail-biter all the way, with more than nine breaks of serve, finally ending with Srujan winning the game 15-11. Surprisingly, he did show some finesse at the net, punctuated by hard drives.

But the effort took too much out of him, as Rathod easily won the last game 15-2.

Karnataka's GM Nischitha, a trainee at the Padukone Academy , won a double, claiming the U-16 singles and doubles title (with Vaidehi Dave). Saina and Anand also won their doubles titles, in the company of Aparna Balan and Sagar Chopda respectively.

Results (All finals):

Boys: U-19: Anand Pawar (Mah) bt Sagar Chopda (Mah) 15-0 15-2

Doubles: Anand Pawar/ Sagar Chopda bt Jishnu Sanyal/ Rohit More (Mah) 15-8 15-6

U-16: Samrudha Rathod (Mah) bt Srujan Nandaluri (AP) 15-13 11-15 15-2

Doubles: Parin Chopda/ Surabh P (Mah) bt Suranjan Bhobora/ Dibya Jyothi Bora (Asm) 15-5 15-6

U-13: Saurabh Verma (MP) bt Raj Kumar (Pun) 15-11 15-5

Doubles: Pratul Joshi/ Aditya Joshi (Utr) bt Surjit Singh/ Pawan Kumar (UP) 15-11 17-14

Girls: U-19: Saina Nehwal (AP) bt Aditi Mutatkar (Mah) 11-2 11-6

Doubles: Saina Nehwal/ Aparna Balan (Ker) bt Soumya T/ Deepthi Shalini (AP) 15-6 15-6

U-16: GM Nischitha (Kar) bt Parsa Naqvi (UP) 11-9 11-3

Doubles: GM Nischitha (Kar)/ Vaidehi Dave (Guj) bt Nitya Sosale/ Ashwini Ponnappa (Kar) 15-6 17-15

U-13: Ankita Ashok bt Tanya Ravi 13-11 11-8

Doubles: Priyanka L/ Lavanya (AP) bt Jyot Kaur Rekhi/ Vaibhavi Sabnis (Mah) 17-16 15-4

U-10: Manasi Jain (MP) bt Amal (AP) 11-2 11-2

Doubles: Amala/ Sindhu (AP) bt Leela Lakshmi/ Jamuna Rani (AP) 15-8 15-7