India star shuttler Lakshya Sen made it to the quarter-final stage of the Kumamoto Masters Japan with a stunning victory over Singapore's Jia Heng Jason Teh in the Last 16 stage. Sen, who is seeded seventh in the tournament, deffeated his opponent 21-13, 21-11 in only 39 minutes. It was another dominant performance from the top-ranked Indian men's shuttler and he will now be aiming to go even further into the tournament.
The first game between Sen and Teh proved to be quite competitive with both players holding leads on different stages. However, Sen eventually took over with the game at 14-13 and didn't allow his opponent to win any more points. He won seven consecutive points to win the set.
The second game saw Sen dominate even more and had taken a 11-3 lead at the interval. He went on to maintain his form after the break and won the match rather comfortably to set up a clash with former world champion Loh Kean Yew from Singapore. The pair will be facing-off in the quarter-finals and are expected to put up a cracker of a match.
Prannoy eliminated after crushing loss
However, things didn't go well for HS Prannoy in his pre quarter-final match against Denmark's Rasmus Gemke. The latter put in a dominating performance and won 21-18, 21-15 in straight sets. Prannoy ended up losing in 46 minutes and exited the tournament.
Sen is the lone survivor
This leaves Sen as India's only hope for a medal from the Kumamoto Masters Japan as the likes of Kiran George and Ayush Shetty were already eliminated in the second round itself. George lost 20-22, 10-21 to Malaysia’s Kok Jing Hong, and Shetty was defeated by the Japanese fourth seed Kodai Naraoka with a score of 16-21, 11-21. No Indian is present in any of the other categories including women's singles, doubles, men's doubles and mixed doubles.