Badminton World Championships Results: Saina, Srikanth Make Winning Starts

World number seven Saina Nehwal and Indian number one Kidambi Srikanth picked up victories in the World Badminton Championships, while the mixed doubles pair of Aparna Balan and Arun Vishnu was knocked out on Tuesday in Copenhagen.

Saina took just 31 minutes to oust Natalia Perminova of Russia 21-11, 21-9 in the second round. The London Olympics bronze medallist will next face Sayaka Takahashi of Japan and could face world number one Li Xuerui in the quarterfinals.

The former world number two played aggressively against her Russian opponent and was in fine rhythm. Saina's court covering was also encouraging during her straight game victory and she seems to have recovered from a leg injury, which caused her to miss the Glasgow Commonwealth Games.

"I could feel the improvement happening," Saina said. "I thought I could get a big title, but I wasn't expecting it to come so soon. I am able to take a lot from that. "

Meanwhile, Srikanth battled past Slovenia's Iztok Utrosa in his opening round match to book a second round clash with Rajiv Ouseph of England.

Srikanth defeated Utrosa 21-11, 11-21, 21-12 in a hard-fought match, which lasted for 47 minutes.

In another men's singles match, Ajay Jayaram received a walkover from fourth seed Kenichi Togo of Japan in the first round.

Jayaram will next face Thailand's Tanongsak Saensomboonsuk, who defeated Scotsman Kieran Merrilees 21-16, 21-17.

The mixed doubles pair of Aparna and Vishnu failed to match their first round performance and crashed out of the tournament. Aparna and Vishnu were no match for the German duo Michael Fuchs and Birgit Michels, going down 21-12, 21-14.

In the men's doubles event, the pair of Manu Attri and B Sumeeth Reddy edged Russia's Nikita Khakimov and Vasily Kuznetsov in a closely-fought encounter. The Indian team won the opening game to take the lead, but the Russians prevailed in the second to level the match.

Both teams were neck and neck in the decider but the Indian duo managed to register a 21-19, 21-23, 21-19 win in exactly one hour. They will be up against the 15th-seeded South Korean pair of Hirokatsu Hashimoto and Noriyasu Hirata in the second round.