Indian shuttler Kidambi Srikanth made a winning start to his men’s singles campaign while the women’s doubles pair of Ashwini Ponnappa and N Sikki Reddy lost their opening match at the season-ending BWF World Tour Finals on Wednesday.

Srikanth, who had reached the knockout stage of the 2014 edition of the year-ending event, registered a straight-game 21-14, 21-16 win over Toma Junior Popov in 42 minutes in his opening match of group B.

Ashwini Ponnappa and N Sikki Reddy suffered a 14-21,18-21 defeat at the hands of the second-seeded Japanese combination of Nami Matsuyama and Chiharu Shida in their opening group B match.

Srikanth, a former world no.1, displayed a compact game. He was alert and agile on the court and found points with his attacks against the world no.33 Frenchman. The opening game was a tight affair in the initial part with the duo fighting tooth and nail.

Srikanth managed to eke out a slender 11-9 lead at the break and then came out with five straight points to move ahead to 16-10 and soon closed out the game.

In the second game, Srikanth lagged 1-4 initially but he soon recovered to once again grab a two-point advantage at the interval.

Just like the first game, he made his way to a healthy 14-9 lead before moving to 19-14. A long shot from his opponent gave Srikanth four match points and he sealed it with some superb netplay.

Srikanth will next face Thailand’s three-time junior world champion Kunlavut Vitidsarn. (INPUTS FROM PTI)