Commonwealth Games: India steamroll Sri Lanka to qualify for mixed team badminton knockouts

Indian shuttlers dished out another splendid show to beat a hapless Sri Lanka 5-0 in their second group A match of the mixed team competition at the 22nd Commonwealth Games in Birmingham on Saturday. A day after blanking Pakistan 5-0, India notched up another convincing win to go to the top of group A and qualify for the quarter-finals with still one match to go in the league stage. Ashwini Ponnappa and Satwiksairaj Rankireddy were back together for the mixed doubles match and the duo looked a little rusty initially before getting past Sachin Dias and Thilini Hendahewa 21-14 21-9 to put India 1-0 ahead. World Championships bronze medallist Lakshya Sen, who is playing his first match after recovering from a shoulder injury, prevailed 21-18 21-5 over veteran Niluka Karunatne, who has competed at the Olympics in 2012, 2016 and 2020. Commonwealth Games: India schedule , Results , Medals tally Akarshi Kashyap, who had made it to the team after topping the selection trials in April, went past Suhasni Vidanage 21-3 21-9 to hand India a 3-0 lead. That was followed by the men’s doubles pair of B Sumeeth Reddy and Chirag Shetty, beating Sri Lanka’s Dumindu Abeywickrama and Dias 21-10, 21-13. The finishing touches to the game were given by the women’s doubles pair of Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand, who defeated Thilini Hendahewa and Vidara Vidanage. That sealed India’s 5-0 demolition of Sri Lanka as they progressed to the knockout stage. India expectedly were by far the better team on display as they completed dominated the proceedings at at Arena Birmingham. The Indian team will face Australia in the final league group match later in the day. With inputs from PTI  Click here for our complete coverage of the 2022 Commonwealth Games. Read all the  Latest News ****,  Trending News ****,  Cricket News ****,  Bollywood News ****,  India News  and  Entertainment News  here. Follow us on  Facebook****,  Twitter and  Instagram****.