Jayaram, Verma to lead charge

​Mumbai: Ajay Jayaram and Sourabh Verma will look to make a mark when they spearhead India's challenge at the Chinese Taipei World Tour Super 300 tournament starting in Taipei on Tuesday.

With two Super 750 world tour events -- Denmark Open (October 16-21) and French Open (October 23-28) scheduled this month, the top Indian shuttlers including P V Sindhu and Kidambi Srikanth have decided to skip the $500,000 event this week.

In their absence, former world No 13 Jayaram and former national champion Sourabh will look to keep the tricolour flying when they begin their campaign in the men's singles competition.

Jayaram, who had reached the finals of $75,000 Vietnam Open and $25,000 White Nights on his comeback after recovering from a hamstring injury, will look to overcome the first round exits in the last couple of tournaments when he faces Japan's Hashiru Shimono.

World No 65 Sourabh, who had won the $75,000 Russian Open in July and had qualified for the Indian team at 18th Asian Games after recovering from injury, will take on local favourite Lee Chia Hao.