Lakshya Sen Signs Off With Creditable Semi-Final Finish At All England Open Badminton Championships

Star shuttler Lakshya Sen missed his date with history after stumbling to a three-game loss against Indonesia's Jonatan Christie in the semifinals of the All England Championships in Birmingham on Saturday, prolonging India's long wait for the coveted trophy. In a game of fine margins, the 22-year-old, who had finished runner-up in the 2022 edition, was marginally short as he slipped to a 21-12, 10-21, 15-21 defeat to world No. 9 Christie, the 2018 Asian Games gold medallist, after a 68-minute smash-fest.

"I am pretty disappointed with the result but, overall, the way I played, surely, I have the level to be there and win the big tournaments," Sen said after the match.

"I have been through some tough patches before this, but there has been lot of support for me in social media but I couldn't do my best today. I made some easy mistakes." Christie will now face fellow Indonesian Anthony Sinisuka Ginting in Sunday's final.

Sen, who reached the semifinals of French Open Super 750 the previous week, has been on court for 491 minutes playing some nerve-wrecking badminton in the last 11 days and, perhaps, those gruelling three-setters might have taken their toll on him as he ran out of steam in the semis.

But those back-to-back semifinal finishes are likely to lock his Paris Olympic berth when the BWF rankings are published by April end.

"All the matches that I played were long so I could feel it in the recovery, in the next day match preparation. All of them were required to win for that particular day," Sen said.

"Some of the matches I started really slow in the first set and having a good lead but not being able to convert in the first setter. This is one thing I would want to close matches in two games." On Friday night,