Priyanshu Rajawat smashed his way into the final of the Orleans Masters BWF Super-300 Badminton tournament in Orleans, France, on Saturday.
Producing at least a dozen smash winners each in both the games, Priyanshu toyed with Nhat Nguyen of Ireland 21-12, 21-9 in the semifinals. This the first Super-300 final for the 21-year-old.
"It's my first super-300 finals and I am feeling extremely good about it," Priyanshu told ToI from Orleans.
Queried about his game plan he said, "To be honest, I had no specific game plan. I am usually calm and that's my nature. I relied more on attack."
Earlier, he had won four international challenge tournaments and was also part of the Indian squad that won the Thomas Cup last year.
The world No.58 had an error-prone start and his four unforced errors helped Nhat to move to 5-2. But after Priyanshu settled down and got his rhythm, Nhat found it quite difficult to stop the Indian.
From 2-5, Priyanshu moved to 8-5 and from 10-9 he zoomed ahead to 15-9 with the help of three jump smashes.
Priyanshu's strategy was simple, if the shuttle was in the range he killed the rally with a smash. He was also good at the net and stretched forward to return the drops.
With Priyanshu hitting everything hard, Nhat focused on reducing the flight of the shuttle but that did not prevent Priyanshu from securing the winners.
In the second game Priyanshu was even more dominant. He started with a 4-0 lead and from 7-3 he came up with 11-point burst leaving little chance for Nhat to make a comeback.
Chief coach Pullela Gopichand was delighted to watch his ward make his first big final. "This is a good win for him. He will improve from here. Today he was hitting so well and looked quite good," Gopichand told ToI.
In the final, Priyanshu will square up against Magnus Johannesen. The Dane defeated Chinese youngster Lei Lan Xi 10-21, 21-15, 21-19.
Priyanshu said he is not thinking much about the final. "For now I just want to give my 100% tomorrow," he said.
