Tough draw for Abhinn at
French Open badminton

Defending champion Abhinn Shyam Gupta, along with fellow-Indians Chetan Anand and Nikhil Kanetkar, is in the Open draw of the $10,000 French Open badminton championships, being played at the Stadium Carpantiere in Paris.

While the qualifying rounds started on Friday, the Open rounds will begin Saturday.

Aparna Popat, the ladies singles champion in 1999, along with Jwala Gutta and B R Meenakshi are in main draw for the ladies singles.

The championships have some high level competition in store as it has attracted high ranking Chinese players in the singles events, which means it is not going to be a cakewalk for the strong 11-member Indian contingent.

Abhinn plays Amir Ghaffar of England in the first round and could face dreaded Chinese player Wu Yugang in the next round.

In fact, Lu Yugang, who was among the Chinese semi-finalists in the All England Open Championships last week, is in the qualifying draw, showing how strong the competition will be.

"I have another Chinese in my quarters and he too is not an easy player to play against. I will of course be trying my very best and will like to retain the title," Abhinn said.

Chetan Anand plays Joachim Fischer Nizlsen of Denmark in the first round and has the top seeded New Zealand player Bellingham in his quarter.

Nikhil Kanitker seems to have the best draw amongst the Indian singles players as he plays English shuttler Schuker in the first round and has second seeded Millroy of Canada in his quarters.

The Chinese Lu Yugang, of course, is the dark horse in the race for the title.

But there are good chances that at least two of the Indians could land up in the semi-finals of this increasingly popular championships, which this year has attracted entries from 23 countries. It is really remarkable the way badminton has been popularised in France and Germany. In both the countries there are over 90,000 registered players, making the game of badminton the the fastest growing sport.

That Germany has virtually dethroned England and Sweden as top badminton-playing counteries speaks volumes of the effort put in by the two countries.

Arvind Bhatt, in the men's, and Trupti Murgunde, in the ladies singles, both singles runners-up in the National championships in India last month, have to qualify for the main draw.

Aparna Popat will open her account against Welsh player Kate Shuddler and Jwala, a doubles specialist, will play English player Elizabeth Cann while B R Meenakshi will play Lebuhanic from France.

But it is in men's doubles where the young Indian duo of Diju and Sanave Thomas will have a trial by fire. The top seeds are expected to win the event, their campaign will start off with a first round match against a Peru doubles pair.