Lakshya Sen stormed into the semi-finals of All England Open on Friday with a comeback win over former champion Lee Zii Jia of Malaysia. Despite losing the first game, the Indian shuttler held on for victories in the next two games to register a 20-22, 21-16, 21-19 win over world No. 10 Lee Zii Jia in the quarterfinal at the United Arena in Birmingham.
This will be his second semi-final for Sen at the All England Open after 2022 when he reached the final before going down to Denmark’s Viktor Axelsen. The world No. 1 Axelsen also lost his quarterfinal 21-8, 18-21, 19-21 on Friday to Indonesia’s Anthony Sinisuka Ginting who will next face France’s Christo Popov in the semis. Popov defeated Koki Watanabe of Japan 21-17, 21-10 in the last eight match.
Sen will face Indonesia’s Jonatan Christie in the semifinal on Saturday. Christie reached the semis by beating China’s Shi Yu Qi. Christie won the first game 21-12 before Shi Yu Qi retired. This means that Christie will be more fresh than Sen in the semis as the Indian took 1 hour and 10 minutes to beat Lee Zii Jia.
Lakhsya Sen vs Lee Zii Jia
Sen, who reached semis recently at French Open before losing to world champion Kunlavut Vitidsarn, was ahead at interval in the first game but the Malaysian levelled the points at 12-all before winning the first game 22-20.
Sen then captured the second game 21-16 and was leading 19-15 in the final game when Lee Zii Jia won four straight points to level the score at 19-all. The comeback, however, didn’t fluster Seen who won the next two points to script a come-from-behind win and reach the semifinals.


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