China's Lu Lan in action against Larisa Griga of Ukraine during the World Badminton Championships at the Gachibowli Stadium in Hyderabad on Tuesday. Lan won 21-16, 21-5. (Reuters)

Hyderabad: After Chetan Anand’s victory on the opening day of the World Badminton Championships at the Gachibowli stadium here, P Kashyap took over the duty Tuesday of giving the home crowd something to cheer about.

The Spanish Open finalist took his time to defeat Iran’s Ali Shahhosseni 21-9, 21-13 to give many supporters a chance to wave the Tricolour from the gallery.

However, it was curtains for the seasoned Arvind Bhat who had his chances but was undone by unforced errors. He lost to the Chinese Taipei’s ninth seed Yu Hsing Hsieh 14-21, 21-19, 22-24.

The men’s doubles team of Arun Vishnu and Tarun Kona could do no better than to haplessly lose their encounter against the 13th seed Chinese Taipei pair of Hung Ling Chen and Yu Lang Lin 12-21, 14-21.

On the women’s side, numerous unforced errors and erratic play cost Sayali Gokhale, the Tata Open winner her match against Dutch Jie Yao 15-21, 14-21.

The eighth seed mixed doubles pair of Jwala Gutta and V. Diju had an easy day as they received a walkover. Their opponents belonged to the English contingent that pulled out over security concerns. The second men’s doubles pair of Akshay Dewalkar and Jishnu Sanyal too received a walkover from their Thai opponents because one of them was running a high fever.

Crowd favourite and fourth seed Taufik Hidayat, who turned 28 on Monday, had a walk in the park as he beat Swiss Christian Boesiger 21-14, 21-14.

The other seeds to advance to the second round were ninth seed Hong Kong shuttler Chen Wang. Eigth seed Korean, Sung Hwan Park was stretched to three games but defeated Steiner Klausen 19-21, 21-13, 21-18.

The only upset in the draw on Day II was Danish Joachim Persson, the seventh seed, who was beaten by Japan’s Kenichi Tago in three tough games.

“It was an easy match,” said Kashyap. “Although the air conditioning draft took me some time to get used to, it felt OK. I had actually fallen sick Monday night due to cough and cold but I felt fine when playing.”

Kashyap is playing second seed Jin Chen next. Chen got the better of Danish Eric Pang in 36 minutes, displaying incredible reflexes to beat him 21-14, 21-19.

“Well, this was a good practice match for the next match against Chen,” Kashyap quipped.

For Arvind, the world No.24, it was a match he lost after being on top for most of the game. “I deserved to win,” he said.

“I’m sad about the end result because I made numerous unforced errors towards the end.” After all, he saved four match points before bowing out on the fifth one. He too had one match point but his opponent proved too good for him.

This was their third meeting and it seemed that Arvind’s jinx stood. They had met twice earlier and Arvind lost on both occasions despite leading by huge margins.

“I played a little safe on match point which I shouldn’t have,” he said.

Arvind complained that the air conditioning draft had affected his game.

Taufik, the Athens Olympics gold medallist, took only 27 minutes to win. “I was playing in a relaxed mode as I was getting used to the conditions here,” the fourth seed Indonesian said. “Although the draft on centre court is fine, I’m not sure about the other courts.”

His take on the swine flu scare was simple. “It’s as random as terrorism. One can never predict it.”

Although Taufik said that Lin Dan or Lee Chong Wei were the favourites, their draws are hard. On the other hand, he has an easier draw.