Asian Junior Badminton 2018: Lakshya Sen justifies sweat and tears by a hard-won historic gold medal

More than half a century after the Indians won the junior and senior titles at the Asian Badminton Championships, an Indian stood at the top of the podium at Jaya Raya Sports Hall in central Jakarta.

Sixteen-year-old Lakshya Sen was the heir to the exploit of Gautam Thakkar, a 53-year-old former Maharashtra player, who won the Asian junior title at Lucknow in 1965, a year that has ended The annals of the Indian badminton as a golden opportunity when returning the machine Dinesh Khanna won the senior Asian title. PV Sindhu remains the only Indian woman to win the Asian junior crown when she achieved the feat in 2012.

As amazing as it may sound, at a time when all badminton fans in India were jumping for joy and uncontrolled fun, after recovering from the sorrow of exclusion complete Indian at the Singapore Open. Championships, Sen was the most realistic and cool as a cucumber when he was congratulated on being only the second male Indian Shuttle after the late Thakkar to annex the Asian junior crown.

"I was well prepared for this competition, as I do for all international tournaments and I felt that I was playing better and better every lap preceding the final," said Almora. Uttarakhand native, Sen had concluded a productive week by winning a much deserved triumph of 21-19, 21-18 over the top seed and the world's No. 1 junior, Kunlavut Vitidsarn of Thailand

. Indian was sneaked into the final of the 128-man board after discarding No. 2 and No. 4 seeds in successive rounds.Sen freely admitted to having felt the pressure not only to be the only Indian player in the final of a tournament dominated by the Chinese but also to be just the sixth seed of the event, facing the world's best junior and favorite to win the title. [19659002] "Kunlavut is a complete player, very fast on his feet, and with all the blows in the book, "said Sen, showing a commendable respect for his opponent. "He does not knock indiscriminately, but when he hits, he has a very hard blow, I decided to mix things up and I usually kept control of the rallies." By day, I found that my drops worked very well. I constantly guess if I would hit a smash, a half-smash, a drop or a late flick. "

Sen's tactics were similar to the strategy he had used in the quarterfinals against the tournament's second seed, Chinese Li Shifeng., Which he had crushed by a score of 21-14, 21-12 and in the penultimate round against the Indonesian Ikhsan Leonardo Imanuel Rumbay, fourth seed, which he had swept to 21-7, 21-14, ahead his team.

"What was most comforting to us all who supported his candidacy for the title was the fact that he was playing a patient and mature game, and that it was not harbaded at any point of the match against an extremely fast match and, "said team coach P Mohan Kumar, who runs a badminton academy in Tiruppur. Coimbatore, and continues to be one of the best players of his age group in the National Veterans' Nationals.

"Lakshya did not seem to be beaten in any of his last three games against seeded players." In the final, even as the Thai player began the game at a fast pace in the first five points, Lakshya took his time to gauge the conditions and his opponent, and was only catching up, he continued to change the pace of the rallies, and never allowed to his rival to settle or win at any pace. "

Did Lakshya learn from his double defeats last May? "Sen lost in three games in the space of three weeks, in the final of the Thomas Cup and New Zealand – after winning the opening game each time."

"These two games were far from me." Sen said. "It was a different opponent and it was a different opponent .I needed to play my game against the forces and to the weaknesses of Kunlavut, which I had observed after seeing some of his previous matches.But yes, I will say that the matches against Lin Dan have given me some lessons and, I think, have made me a best player. "Besides, I think every defeat has made me a better player."

This will learn from his mistakes, and the intensity with which he s'. Approaching his badminton, can be measured from a commentary by advertising guru, author and screenwriter Manoj Ramachandran, father of Indian star Shlok, who had seen Lakshya play at six at the 2007 Sub-Junior National Championships at Dehradun, just a few kilometers from his hometown of Almora

. This six-year-old boy won four qualifying rounds before losing his last qualifying round in three games and crying inconsolably in one corner of the room, "says Ramachandran

. he had beaten four boys who were much older than him and had also narrowly lost a four-year-old boy his eldest. He always felt the pain of losing.

Lakshya's perspective and her burning desire to win have not changed a bit in the next five years: Pullela Gopichand, national coach and winner of the Dronacharya Award, remembers Lakshya accompanying her older brother Chirag and his father, noting the badminton coach, DK Sen, in Hyderabad, while the latter was looking to place Chirag in the Gopi Academy: "He asked that he audition to show to what he was good, "says the famous coach. "

Rakesh Khanna, who, along with the great hockey player Viren Rasquinha, was director of Olympic Gold Quest (OGQ) – the organization that for more than a decade has been taking over. tab for training and tournament participation expenses. "I clearly remember Lakshya Sen as a 10-year-old boy, debuting at the Padukone Badminton Academy Prakash (PPBA) in Bangalore in 2011.

"We took it for him, OGQ has been supporting Lakshya since the age of 10 and is currently providing him with a physiotherapist, a coach, a nutritionist and sports psychologists, and I remember that PPBA and OGQ have sent to a tournament in Singapore and that he won the under-11 test, beating the same Indonesian player – Rumbay – that he beat in the Asian Juniors semifinal on Saturday in front of the local crowd. "

The Asian Junior Gold Medal is, strangely, not the first pi Lakshya Sen silverware from the event Two years ago, as a 14-year-old playing at the CPB badminton training center in Bangkok, he had to After losing a semi-final against the Chinese Sun Feixiang then aged 18, Sunday, the tears that he lost during this result of 2016 were replaced by a dazzling smile and the coveted yellow metal