French 8 March (Punjab khabarnama):Going through a rough phase recently, Lakshya Sen suffered yet another first-round exit at the start of the year when he lost to Priyanshu Rajawat at home in the Delhi Open. The message then from his long-time coach Vimal Kumar was simple: ‘Just because you lost some first-round matches recently, doesn’t mean you are a bad player.’
The team around Lakshya believed that the results didn’t necessarily match the work he was putting in. Some of his defeats last year could have been put down to not being in physically good shape but the Delhi Open defeat wasn’t down to that. He evidently has been clocking some of the best fitness numbers he has. But for all that to bear fruit, Lakshya needed a result of significance on the World Tour. Forget qualification for the Olympics, just for his confidence to return, he needed a shot in the arm.
He received that late on Thursday night in Paris – at the venue for the Olympic Games no less, where he’d still be hoping to turn up later this year. In the round of 16 at the French Open, Lakshya came up with a fabulous come-from-behind win to defeat world No 4 Li Shi Feng 16-21, 21-15, 21-13 in an 81-minute thriller.With Vimal and the legendary Prakash Padukone on his coaching bench, Lakshya started off a little tentatively against the big-hitting Shi Feng. The rising Chinese star has one of the biggest smashes in the game going around currently, but Lakshya soon got into the groove and showed his whip smash can also be deadly. An intense opening game was in the balance at 10-11 but Shi Feng pulled ahead after the interval. One of the concern areas that remains for Lakshya is to arrest a slide mid-match, where he tends to lose a handful of points on the trot.But he’d recover quickly and lead from start to finish in the second game to force the decider, nailing a series of down-the-line smashes, after going crosscourt mostly in the opener. “Chhodna mat,” was the message from his coaches. Keep at it. The decider saw a brutal 56-shot rally in the early exchanges and despite some sensational defence from Shi Feng, Lakshya kept at it to take the point… and with it, some wind out of the sails of his opponent.
Shi Feng did have his moments after that too, but physically, Lakshya had the edge. As they changed ends, Lakshya led 11-10. The commentator would soon notice how the Indian was still looking fresh on court while his opponent was fading out. So it would prove, as Lakshya raced through the rest of the match, winning 12 out 13 points at one stage. Lakshya would head over immediately to the coaching bench and offer his respects to Vimal and Padukone, who would have been equally relieved.
