Srikanth & Lakshya plow through

Hylo Open: India’s Kidambi Srikanth & Lakshya Sen fought long and hard and made their way into the semifinals.

It was another hard day at the office for Kidambi Srikanth. The former world no.1 who played 56-minute long quarterfinals against Lee Dong Keun had to put through an hour and four minutes to beat NG Ka Long Angus.

The third seed Angus was the hot favorite as he held a 3-2 head-to-head lead against the Indian and had beaten Srikanth in the last two encounters.

The sixth-seeded Indian who is trying to rediscover his brilliant past was in a zone of his own as took the first game 21-11 with ease. Angus fought back and took the second game 12-21, leveled the match, and forced a decider.

The third game was a superb duel as both the athletes tried to dominate each other at every point. In the end, Srikanth sealed the match 21-19 and set the head-to-head record straight.

Next was former junior world no.1 taking on the former world champion, Lakshya Sen versus Kunlavut Vitidsarn. This match too followed the same story, Vitidsarn led Lakshya head-to-head 3-2. The young Indian pulled off a gritty performance and outmaneuvered the Thai. Lakshya and Vitidsarn played a marathon of a match that lasted close to an hour and eighteen minutes. Lakshya kept his cool like his senior(Srikanth) in the decider and closed the match 21-18, 12-21, 21-19.

In the semis, Srikanth will face off against Malaysia’s Lee Zii Jia and Lakshya Sen against Singapore’s Loh Kean Yew.