India’s star badminton player Lakshya Sen has performed brilliantly in the Paris Olympics 2024 and has confirmed his place in the semi-finals of men’s singles. Lakshya Sen defeated Chou Tien Chen of Chinese Taipei 19-21, 21-15, 21-12 in the quarter-final match. For the first time an Indian badminton player has reached the semi-finals of men’s singles in the Olympic Games. Now Lakshya would like to ensure at least a silver medal by winning the semi-final match.
22-year-old Lakshya Sen will face Tokyo Olympics 2020 champion Victor Axelsen of Denmark in the semi-finals. Victor is currently at second place in the world ranking and has won the World Championship twice. On the other hand, India’s Lakshya Sen’s ranking is 22. The semi-final match of Lakshya and Excelsen is to be played on 4th August (Sunday) at 3.30 pm Indian time. After the defeat of PV Sindhu as well as the pair of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty, now all hopes are pinned on the target in badminton in the Paris Olympics.
The h2h record of both the players should be like this
However, the semi-final match is not going to be easy for Lakshya Sen. So far eight matches have been played between Axelsen and Lakshya, out of which the Danish shuttler won seven. Lakshya could defeat Axelsen only on one occasion. Lakshya’s only win against Axelsen came in the German Open in 2022, in which he won the third game 22-20. This was two years ago, but it may give Lakshya confidence that Axelsen is not a big challenge for them.
If seen, the last match between Lakshya Sen and Victor Axelsen took place in the Singapore Open earlier this year. Both of them met in Round-32 of that tournament. Then in the match that lasted three games, Axelsen won 21-13, 16-21, 21-13. Another good news for Lakshya is that Axelsen has not been in that much form this year. He was out early in some major tournaments.
Victor Axelsen and Lakshya Sen are going to give their all on this big stage. Axelsen is adept at quick exchanges at the net, drop shots and big smashes from deep in the court. Apart from this, Axelsen also likes shot-making. This helps them stay in the rally and control rallies instead of playing defensively.
Lakshya Sen will have to give his 100 percent against Victor. The performance that Lakshya showed against Chou Tian Chen will have to be repeated in this match as well. There is no doubt that Lakshya is capable of doing this. He is one of the best defensive players in the world. The combination of defense and attack shown by Lakshya against Chou was quite brilliant. The crosscourt smash from left to right worked really well for the goal in the quarter-finals.
Both players trained together
Lakshya Sen was not included in the Indian team for the Thomas Cup this year. After this Lakshya trained with former world number-1 player. Lakshya’s coach Vimal Kumar had revealed this. Vimal said, ‘When Lakshya came back, he mentioned Victor’s professional attitude. Like how intense his training sessions were and how focused he was during training. These were the things that were really eye-opening for Lakshya.