BIRMINGHAM (England), July 29: Former world number one Peter Gade, who is trying to make a comeback after a knee operation, was beaten in the first round for the first time in his career in the world championships on Monday.

The 26-year-old Dane was close to tears after a 15-11, 15-6 loss to Sony Dwi Kuncoro, the sixth-seeded Asian champion from Indonesia, who would not have been competing but for the ten-week postponement caused by the SARS virus.

Gade, whose preparation had been made with another former world number one from Denmark, Morten Frost, had hoped he might have recovered enough to cause a surprise.

Gade’s compatriot, Peter Rasmussen, the former world champion and another who has come back from career-threatening injuries, fared better.

He survived a long drawn out tussle of left-handers with Nikhil Kanetkar, the Indian international, by 15-4, 9-15, 15-5 but now faces a tough test against Ronald Susilo, an Indonesian who now represents Singapore.

Another former world champion from Denmark, Camilla Martin, began her last world championship before retirement by conceding only four points against Tatiana Vattier of France.

The 29-year-old should come through to a quarter-final with Zhang Ning, the number two seed from China, who started with a 11-1, 11-4 success against Ekaterina Ananina of Russia.

Another Chinese title contender, Zhou Mi, the fifth seed, had to survive a minor crisis, saving a game point before coming through a long drawn out first game against her former compatriot Yao Jie to reach the second round.

The 24-year-old from Guangxi province won 13-11,11-2, but only after slipping to 9-10 when she saved the game with a tight net shot, inducing Yao to make a hurried flick lift which sailed just long.

The first seed to go out was the 14th seeded Japanese player Miko Tanaka, who was beaten 1-11, 11-2, 11-4 by Tracey Hallam, the Commonwealth Games silver medallist from England.

Hallam, who had plenty of home support, started badly against the drift and won most of her points from the other end, where she was often able to control the style and tempo of the rallies.

However there were crucial moments when Tanaka started the third game with the drift but could not reach the change of ends (when once player scores six) with the cushion of a lead.

From 6-4 at the change Hallam ran away with the match to avenge a defeat in their only previous encounter, in the Malaysian Open several years ago.

Later two other women’s singles seeds lost.

The 16th-seeded Julia Mann, who equalled the record of eight English national singles titles in February, was well beaten 11-3, 11-4 by Chien Yu-Chin of Taiwan.

Then Marina Andrievskaya, the 11th-seeded Soviet-born Swede, recovered from a six point deficit in the final game to reach eight-all - only to fall 6-11, 11-3, 11-8 to Jun Jae-Youn of South Korea.

However Andrievskaya’s departure was not as galling as that of her former compatriots, Elena Schinko and Marina Yakusheva, who transgressed two different clothing regulations and were disqualified.

First the Russian women’s doubles partnership appeared in one white and one blue shirt, breaking the rule which requires the same colours to be worn.

They then returned both wearing white, but Yakusheva’s shirt now had no identification, falling foul of the names on back rule.

It enabled Gail Emms and Donna Kellogg to progress without hitting a shuttle and the English pair now believe they are a fair bet to get past the 15th seeded Koreans, Hwang Yu-Mi and Lee Hyo-Jung.

Men’s results: Chunlai Bao (China) bt Jean-Michel LeFort (France) 15-6 15-0; Hidetaka Yamada (Japan) bt Rasmus Wengberg (Sweden) 15-8 13-15 15-2; Peter Rasmussen (Denmark) bt Nikhil Kanetkar (India) 15-4 9-15 15-5; Sony Dwi Kuncoro (Indonesia) bt Peter Gade (Denmark) 15-11 15-6; Dan Lin (China) bt Per-Henrik Croona (Sweden) 15-6 15-8; Taufik Hidayat (Indonesia) bt Abhinn Shyam Gupta (Indonesia) 15-7 15-10; Bjoern Joppien (Germany) bt Arturo Ruiz (Spain) 15-5 15-3; Przemyslaw Wacha (Poland) bt Sam Smith (Canada) 9-15 15-4 15-2; Marco Vasconcelos (Portugal) bt Pedro Yang (Guatemala) 15-5 15-5.

Women’s results:

Played late on Monday: Jun Jae-youn (South Korea) bt Marina Andrievskaya (Sweden) 6-11 11-3 11-8; Susan Hughes (Scotland) bt Marketa Koudelkova (Czech Republic) 11-1 11-4; Karina De Wit (Netherlands) bt Denyse Julien (Canada) 13-10 8-11 11-3; Chien Yu-chin (Tawain) bt Julia Mann (England) 11-3 11-4; Anu Weckstrom (Finland) bt Simone Prutsch (Austria) 11-1 11-0; Elena Sukhareva (Russia) bt Eva Lee (U.S.) 11-6 11-3; Agnese Allegrini (Italy) bt Diana Dimova (Bulgaria) 11-0 11-9; Zhang Ning (China) bt Ekaterina Ananina (Russia) 11-1 11-4; Camilla Martin (Denmark) bt Tatiana Vattier (France) 11-3 11-1; Yuli Marfuah (Indonesia) bt Maja Tvrdy (Slovenia) 13-10 8-11 13-10.—Agencies