The Indian challenge ends in Finland

Lakshya Sen’s return to the badminton tour ended in the round of 16 of the Arctic Open Super 500 in Vantaa, Finland, on Thursday after a narrow three-set loss to Chou Tien Chen of Chinese Taipei.

There were seven competitions, spread across categories, involving Indians. However, no one managed to reach the respective quarter-finals.

In their first meeting since the Paris 2024 Olympic Games quarter-final, Sen managed to win the first match, but after being shocked. The Indian shuttler had taken a 13-7 lead but Chou was able to claw his way back into the match and level the score at 15-15.

The Chinese Taipei player had even taken a lead of 19-17, but Sen managed to grab four points on the trot and thus secure the first game with 21-19.

Sen then raced to a 6-2 and later 9-5 lead in the second, before Chou found a way back into the match. At 13-13, the seventh seed from Chinese Taipei took a lead he was unwilling to relinquish and eventually won the match 21-18, sending the match into the decider.

Chou took advantage of the momentum and raced to a 10-2 lead and held on to secure the match with a 19-21, 21-18, 21-15 win.

In the other men’s singles match, qualifier Kiran George suffered a 17-21, 8-21 defeat to fifth seed Jonatan Christie.

In women’s singles, Malvika Bansod’s competition came to an end in a 38-minute match against Thailand’s Ratchanok Intanon, who reached the quarter-finals with a 21-15, 21-8 victory over the Indian.

Unnati Hooda also lost her Round of 16 match, losing to Canada’s Michelle Li 10-21, 19-21.

Later, Aakarshi Kashyap suffered a heavy 9-21, 8-21 defeat by second-seeded Chinese player Han Yui.

In the mixed doubles, Sathish Kumar Karunakaran and Aadya Variyath were defeated 21-12, 21-15 by fourth-seeded Chinese duo Cheng Xing and Zhang Chi.

And in the women’s doubles, the Panda sisters, Rituparna and Swetaparna, lost 8-21, 10-21 to top seeds Liu Sheng Shu and Tan Ning of China.