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World Junior Championship: Lakshya Sen advance to quarter-finals
Young Lakshya Sen surpassed Chen Shiau Cheng of Chinese Taipei to advance to the quarter-finals of the BWF World Junior Championship in Markham, Canada.
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The defending Junior Asian champion overcame the ninth-seed Chinese Taipei 15-21, 21-17, 21-14 in an hour-long contest at the pre-quarters of the men’s singles event.
Lakshya, 17, will next take on Aidil Sholeh ALI Sadikin and a victory against the Malaysian will take him to the semi-finals guarantying at least a bronze medal. Saina Nehwal is the only Indian shuttler to win a gold medal at the Junior World Championship. She had won the top honours in 2008.
It was Cheng, who had started well and looked in fine touch as he marched to a victory in the opening game winning 21-15 to set the tone for a straight sets win. But former World No.1 Lakshya bounced back to clinch the next two with utter conviction to advance.
He had earlier seen-off Mexico’s Armando Gaitan in the third round winning it 21-13, 21-9, having already beaten Giovanni Toti of Italy in the previous round. He received a bye in the opening match.
The men’s doubles pair of Vishnu Vardhan Goud Panjala and Srikrishna Sai Kumar Podile also progressed to the quarter-finals with a straight-sets victory against the Indonesian combo of Dwiki Rafian Restu and Bernadus Bagas Kusuma Wardana.
They beat Restu-Wardana 21-11, 21-17, and will next take on the 10th seeded Tae Yang Shin and Chan Wang of Korea.
Also Read: Hong Kong Open: Kidambi Srikanth ousted by Kenta Nishimoto in the quarter-final
Meanwhile, it was curtains for the rest of India’s contingent at the competition with Priyanshu Rajawat, Alap Mishra and Kiran George losing in the third round of the men’s singles, while Malvika Bansod and Gayatri Gopichand were knocked out in the first and second rounds of the women’s singles category.
Women’s doubles pair of Aditi Bhatt and Tanisha Crasto also crashed out after losing 13-21, 11-21 to Indonesia’s Agatha Imanuela and Siti Fadia Silva Ramadhanti.
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