Sridhar shocks Gade to enter last eight

Olympian Anup Sridhar pulled off one of the biggest upsets of the tournament, beating world No 2 Peter Gade of Denmark to enter the quarter-finals of the Singapore Open Super Series badminton tournament.

Ace shuttler Saina Nehwal also reached the quarter-finals after staving off a scare from Indonesian Adrianti Firdasari in Singapore City.

The sixth seed Saina beat the 19th-ranked Firdasari 21-18, 17-21, 21-17, in a 50-minute battle.

The day, however, belonged to Sridhar. The world No 39 Indian defeated third seed Gade 21-19, 16-21, 21-13 in an edge-of-the-seat thriller that lasted close to an hour.

In the quarter-finals, Sridhar takes on Thailand's Boonsak Ponsana, who beat sixth seed Simon Santoso 21-11, 21-7.

Sridhar opened up a four-point lead at 14-10 in the first game and although the Dane clawed back at 15-all first and then 16-17, the Bangalore shuttler battled his way to eventually pocket the game.

The second game also could have gone either way as the duo went neck-and-neck from 3-3 to 9-9 before the Dane stamped his mark and raced away with the game. The decisive third game turned out to be a complete thriller as the scores ran neck and neck -- 3-3, 5-5 and then 11-11 -- before Sridhar broke free and grabbed seven straight points to seal the match.