India's badminton superstar Saina Nehwal is the 2016 champion of the XiamenAir Australian Badminton Open World Superseries women's singles. Saina earned the title after winning China's Sun Yu in the final round of the tournament in Sydney on Sunday.

The 26-year-old native of Hisar, Haryana was able to get the better of the Chinese player to claim her second Aussie-based World Superseries crown and her first title for this season.

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Saina, a 2012 Summer Olympics bronze medalist for the women's singles event, lost the opening game after just 18 minutes. However, the Rio Games-bound badminton player bounced back and won the second set to put the screws on a deciding third game.

In the final set, the Indian badminton ace had to fight tooth and nail but took advantage of the momentum of the game and sealed the match with a strenuous 11-21, 21-14, 21-19 win. The match lasted for one hour and 11 minutes. Seventh-seeded Saina clinched the seventh Superseries title of her career with the win.

Before her triumph, Saina had to battle her way to the top of the prestigious tournament. She had beaten Australian Joy Lai in the opening round before eliminating Jin Wei Goh of Malaysia in the second round of the competition.

 Saina is now US$56,250.00 richer and has improved her lead in the head-to-head matchup record against Sun.

Tagsbwf rankings, bwf, xiamenair australian badminton open, saina nehwal, sun yu, wang yihan, Ratchanok Intanon