Badminton: Sai Praneeth stuns Olympic champ Chen Long in Basel, Lakshya Sen dissatisfied at China Masters
India’s B Sai Praneeth dissatisfied reigning Olympic champion and 2nd seed Chen Long 21-18, 21-13 on Saturday to reach the Swiss Open Super three hundred very last at Basel. The victory, the Indian’s first over the big Chinese name in 3 fits, means that Sai Praneeth has reached a summit clash on the BWF excursion for the first time for the reason of the 2017 Thailand Open final. He will now face some other Chinese Shi Yuqi (the top seed) inside the very last. The world range of 22 Indians genuinely began ad the underdog towards Chen Long, who had in no way dropped a sport in opposition to Sai Praneeth.
And it seemed like the shape would follow a comparable script while the Chinese unfolded a 6-2 lead within the beginning recreation. But Sai Praneeth confirmed that he wasn’t going down without combat with the aid of prevailing one of the most extended rallies of the suit to stage ratings at 6-6. Though mistakes were immediately observed, Chen entered the mid-sports c language with an 11-7 lead; Sai Praneeth began discovering his footing. He proved that after gaining 10 of the 12 points after the restart. He turned into super on the net and displayed the persistence required to earn a spot in opposition to the excessive constant Chinese. In the bargain, he additionally controlled to pressure Chen into making mistakes of his personal.
With the opening sport in his pocket, Sai Praneeth grew in self-belief, displaying his repertoire of strokes but not wavering from the sports plan constructed around hundreds of patients. He did lower his protection a little while he allowed Chen to close in on eleven-10 after taking an 11-7 lead on the spoil. But luck changed into the Indian’s facet as a net chord gave him his 13th factor, and he did no more extended appearance lower back after that. He accurately used the round-the-head pass courtroom shots and outplayed the Chinese at the net. It becomes best that he won the suit with another spherical-the-head crosscourt winner to wrap the suit in forty-six minutes.
Lakshya Sen was disappointed by using a decrease-ranked player. Elsewhere, Lakshya Sen went down combating the China Masters after struggling to a three-sport defeat in the men’s singles semifinals in Lingshui on Saturday. Lakshya appeared upon a following large component in Indian guys’ badminton, fought teeth and nail for one hour and two minutes instead then dropping nine-21, 21-12, 17-21 towards China’s Weng Hongyang, ranked 154 places under the Indian. Hongyang will play compatriot Liu Haichao on Sunday at the very last. Haichao got the better of Malaysia’s Iskandar Zulkarnain 21-9 20-22 21-16 in another engrossing semifinal contest.
