After putting up a spirited show in the finals at the All England Open Championship, Indian shuttler Lakshya Sen expressed gratitude towards his parents and coaches and said that he wants to continue his good form in future tournaments as well.
Lakshya Sen lost to world number one Olympic champion Viktor Axelsen in the men's singles final at All England Badminton Open Championships.
"I think the last two weeks, the matches that I have played, and opponents I have played against like Ginting Antony, Lee Zii Jia, defeated Viktor for the first time and this is the biggest thing I can take from these two tournaments. Playing an All England Open finals gives you a lot of self-confidence and self-belief and I hope that this form continues in my future tournaments as well," said Lakshya during a press conference.
Speaking about his good form, the shuttler said that during the pandemic he used to play other sports as well to maintain his game.
"I think I have improved a lot in the last two years. Due to the pandemic, we had a lot of time off, so we could train and I think I did really well. I was not doing much so I used to do a lot of off-court training. I started playing other sports also to train myself. Then, I got to play many tournaments continuously and those long matches and long rallies have helped me in improving my game," said the shuttler.
Danish shuttler defeated Sen by 21-10, 21-15 at Utilita Arena in Birmingham in the match that lasted 53 minutes.
Viktor Axelsen has now increased his lead in head-to-head matches against Sen by 5-1.
The young Indian shutter was bidding to become only the third Indian after Prakash Padukone (1980) and Pullela Gopichand (2001) to win the All England Open Badminton Championships, or simply All England which is the world's oldest and most prestigious badminton tournament.
Sen is only the fifth Indian - after Prakash Nath (1947), Prakash Padukone (1980 and 1981), Pullela Gopichand (2001) and Saina Nehwal (2015) - to make the summit clash of All England.
India's rising badminton star has been in top form in recent times. He secured his maiden world championships bronze in December, before winning his first Super 500 title at India Open in January and finishing runner-up at the German Open last week.
( With inputs from ANI )
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