Saina Nehwal had to wait for almost two years to win a title on the Badminton World Federation circuit since her Malaysia Masters triumph back in January 2017. But the 28-year-old insisted that she wasn’t happy about the nature of her triumph in the Indonesia Masters BWF World Tour Super 500 given the circumstances.
Nehwal was clearly playing second fiddle to world champion Carolina Marin in the summit clash in Jakarta on Sunday before the Spaniard injured her knee and was forced to concede the match, handing the Indian her fourth title in the Indonesian capital.
“I am not very happy the way I got it (title) today. I was very happy that I could reach the final by beating such difficult opponents... But in the final, of course Carolina had the upper hand in the first game. I wanted to fight more, wanted to see how the match goes on but it was unfortunate to see something like that happen. I feel bad for her,” said Nehwal, who had immediately rushed to check on Marin after the Spaniard injured her right knee and was crying in pain.
“It’s not good to see at all. I have been someone who has been getting injured for the last two year and to see something like this happen on court is very very painful,” Nehwal said.
“I know how it is mentally. When I got the knee injury, I was also very upset because it was just before the Olympics. I was crying like anything and had to go through surgery. So I know how difficult it is to go through such injuries,” the Indian stated, reminiscing about her own injury struggles.
“But finally the sport is like that, its cruel on the players. We try to keep ourselves as fit as we can but sometimes you cannot control the conditions. Carolina is someone who is the fittest. Of course a great player achieving so much but she is also the fittest and strongest of all the players. And when something happens like that in between the match, its very very painful,” Nehwal said, adding that she hoped the injury wasn’t very serious.
Speaking about the tournament, Nehwal said she was happy with the way she played through out the week as she was coming back after missing almost a month of training due to a shin injury and didn’t had much expectations.
“I never thought I would reach this far in these two tournaments after the shin injury I had in December. The whole of December I took a break, I was not even playing. So this was a very positive outcome,” she added.
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