The Odisha Open badminton tournament, with $75,000 up for grabs, has only limited international flavour, with not a single top seed across five sections showing up at Cuttack.
The unprecedented number of last-minute withdrawals left the officials worried and the list could not be made public until close to 2 am on Tuesday. It was tough to find replacements for those pulling out of the qualifying as well as the main rounds. A fair number of no-shows played havoc with the schedule.
The withdrawal of the seeded entries across sections was startling.
