Lakshya Sen goes through to the semis of the All England Championship 2022

Lakshya Sen has become only the third Indian men’s player to enter the semi-finals of the All England Open Badminton Championship 2022 singles event taking place in Birmingham on Friday.

World number 11 Lakshya Sen, had to lock horns against the world No. 27 Lu Guang Zu of China in the quarter-finals. However, the Indian received a walkover after his opponent pulled out at the last minute.

Prakash Padukone in 1980, 1981 and Pullela Gopichand in 2001 were the only Indian men’s singles players to have made the All England Open semi-finals in the open era previously.

While Prakash Padukone finished as runners-up in 1981, the Indians went on to win the title on the other two occasions.

In the semi-finals, Lakshya Sen will take on the winner from the match between world No. 7 Lee Zii Jia and two-time world champion and world No. 2 Kento Momota.

Lakshya Sen has been in good form recently. After winning bronze at the world championships in December, Lakshya Sen defeated world champion Loh Kean Yew for the India Open title in January.

Earlier this month, Lakshya Sen accounted for Tokyo Olympics champion Viktor Axelsen in the German Open semi-finals and defeated world No. 3 Anders Antonsen in his last match.

On the other court, the women’s doubles pair of Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand, ranked world No. 46, also moved into the semi-finals after stunning the world No. 2 duo of Lee Sohee and Shin Seungchan 14-21, 22-20, 21-15.

With this win, Treesa and Gayatri have become the first Indian women’s pair to make the semis of All England Open.

Earlier, PV Sindhu, a two-time Olympic medallist, suffered an upset loss to world No. 13 Sayaka Takahashi of Japan while Saina Nehwal went down fighting against the reigning world champion Akane Yamaguchi in three games.

Kidambi Srikanth also crashed out after losing to Indonesia’s Anthony Ginting in a close match.