Born : 17th of March 1990
Saina Nehwal is regarded as the prolific Indian Badminton player and she is arguably the best female Indian Badminton player currently in India. She has achieved some remarkable feats in past one year like achieving the 2nd ranking in the world, winning three International tournaments back to back and upsetting top seeded players in World Badminton. Her biggest achievement is that she became the first Indian woman to reach the Quart Final round at the Olympic Games. She was awarded Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna Award this year for her magnificent performance in International tournaments.
Saina Nehwal belongs to the Hisar in Haryana and she got her badminton genes from both of her parents including Dr. Harvir Singh and mother Usha Rani. Her parents were former State Badminton Champions. Dr. Harvir Singh encouraged her daughter to took up game of badminton. Saina started playing badminton at a tender age of 8 under the careful eyes of her coach Nani Prasad. She adopted a tough training schedule from the beginning. She was trained further under S.M. Arif who is a Dronacharya Award winning Badminton Coach. The Pullela Gopichand’s Academy of Badminton became the training ground of Saina Nehwal where she had developed her game and polished her skills.
She won the National Junior Championship in the year 2004, and defended it again in 2005. She won the National Senior Championship in 2006 and successfully repeated it in 2007 again. In addition to this, she has also won the All India Jr. Ranking Tournaments held at Chennai in 2005 and All India Senior Ranking Tournament at Mumbai. She was also the clear winner at the National Games that took place at Guwahati.
Saina has shown her mettle at the international badminton scene by defeating many top seeded players. She won the Super Series tournament, by clinching the Indonesian open in 2009 with victory over higher-ranked Chinese Wang Lin. She continued her winning streak by winning second Super Series title of her career and won Singapore Open title on June 20, 2010. She completed her hat trick of title by winning Indonesian Open on June 27, 2010.
Saina successfully defended her Swiss Open Title by defeating World No 2 Wang Shixian of China 21–19 21–16 on 18 March 2012, a day after she turned 22 years old. On 10 June 2012, Saina defeated Thailand’s Ratchanok Inthanon 19–21 21–15 21–10, to lift the Thailand Open Grand Prix Gold title.
On 17 June 2012, Saina Nehwal won the Indonesia Open Super Series by defeating World No. 3 Li Xuerui of China 13–21, 22–20 21–19. It was her 3rd Indonesia Open title. On 4 August 2012, she won the bronze medal at the London Olympics when China’s Wang Xin retired from the match after an injury with the match at 18–21, 0–1. On 21 October 2012, she won the Denmark Open Super Series Premier after defeating Wang Yihan 21-12 12-7 in the semifinal. Yihan got retired hurt in this match after losing first set and trailing in second set. In the final Saina defeated Juliane Schenk of Germany in two straight sets to lift her first Denmark open trophy.
On 26 January 2014 Saina defeated World Championship bronze medalist P.V. Sindhu 21-14, 21-17 to win the Women’s Singles of India Open Grand Prix Gold Tournament. On March,2014 World No. 4 Saina Nehwal, who had a win-loss record of 4-2 against the Chinese ace Wang Shixian, crashed out of the 2014 All England Super Series Premier after losing her quarter-final match. Saina took revenge of All England loss by defeating Wang Shixian in semifinals of 2014 Australian Super Series. In final on June 29, 2014 Saina defeated Spain’s Carolina Marin 21-18, 21-11 to win Women’s Singles of 2014 Australian Super Series. The win helped her to reach the ranking of World no. 7, climbing two spots.
She became the 1st Indian woman to win the China Open Super Series Premier by beating Japan’s Akane Yamaguchi 21-12, 22-20 in the final.
Defending Champion Saina Nehwal won the 2015 India Open Grand Prix Gold by defeating Spain’s Carolina Marin 19-21, 25-23, 21-16 in the Final.