Lakshya Sen and Kidambi Srikanth chalked out facile wins over their respective rivals to set up an all-India pre quarter finals at
Indonesia Open Badminton tournament in Jakarta on Wednesday.
Commonwealth Games champion Lakshya Sen defeated world No. 11 Lee Zii Jia of Malaysia 21-17, 21-13 in the round of 32, while former world No. 1 Kidambi Srikanth overwhelmed China’s Lu Guang Zu a 21-13, 21-19 in his opener.
Playing at the Istora Senayan sports arena, world No. 20 Lakshya Sen and the 2021 All England champion, Lee Zii Jia engaged in a close battle in the first game. However, with the scores tied 17-all,the Indian won four consecutive points to take the lead in the match. In the second game, Lakshya Sen dominated Lee Zii Jia to clinch the 33-minute affair.
Later, Kidambi Srikanth hardly faced a challenge from world No. 13 Lu Guang Zu in the first game. The second game was a closely-fought affair as Lu Guang Zu rallied from 18-11 down to tie the scores at 19-all. However, Kidambi Srikanth held his nerves to win the tie in 46 minutes.
With the win, World no 22 Kidambi Srikanth extended his head-to-head win record over Lu Guang Zu to 5-0.
The third Indian shuttler in the singles event, Priyanshu Rajawat was given a walkover by Kunlavut Vitidsarn of Thailand in their first-round match.
In the women’s singles, Aakarshi Kashyap lost tamely to world No. 2 An Se Young of Korea 10-21,4-21 in the round of 32. The Korean is eyeing her sixth BWF World Tour title this year.
PV Sindhu and HS Prannoy already advanced to the second round on Tuesday. Chirag Shetty and Satwiksairaj Rankireddy are also in the men’s doubles
round of 16.