Shuttler Lakshya Sen Goes Down Fighting

India’s promising shuttler Lakshya Sen lost out to Malaysia’s Lee Zii Jia in the bronze play-off at the Paris Games on Monday. Earlier,  Sen chucked away a big chance to earn the tag of a giant killer! Sports offers opportunities of a lifetime to dethrone champions and the 22 year old could not have given a better gift to his mentors, Prakash Padukone and Vimal Kumar, by bringing down the defending Olympic men’s singles champion — Viktor Axelsen had won the men’s singles badminton title at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics — in the Paris 2024 semi-finals. Up 17-11 in the first game and 7-0 in the second, the young aspirant squandered openings to thrash the great Dane and bid for the gold. Nothing had prepared Axelson for an inspiring and incisive display by Sen; perhaps even Padukone and Kumar would have been surprised by their charge’s extraordinary stroke play bringing out the best from his repertoire. Sen had put it across two seeded players — Indonesia’s Jonatan Christie and Chinese Taipei’s Chou Tien Chen — to get into the semi-finals. When the other Indians could not rise above the mediocrity, Sen appeared like a shining star, all ready to conquer the World.  The La Chapelle Arena was packed with the roaring India supporters and Sen had just done his part to encourage them to be full throated. Eventually he appeared to have lacked the killer instinct. Every minute after he offset the 0-3 deficit, he looked the part as a conqueror. But as they say in sport: He petered out, losing the grip on the semi-finals.