Shuttler Sen settles for silver
Buenos Aires, Oct. 13: Promising Indian shuttler Lakshya Sen settled for a silver medal after he lost the men’s singles summit clash against Li Shifeng of China in straight games at the Youth Olympics here.
Sen, the reigning junior Asian champion, lost 15- 21, 19- 21 in a 42- minute final match to bag the silver. He had beaten Shifeng in straight games in the quarterfinals of the Asian Championships in July but on Friday evening, it was the turn of the Chinese to turn the tables on the 17- year- old.
In both the games, Shifeng led all through and Sen was playing catch- up, eventually failing to succeed.
In the first game, Shifeng took an early lead and raced to 14- 5 in no time. Sen made a fine recovery to narrow down the gap to 13- 16 but he could not sustain it and Shifeng went ahead 18- 13 and then made it 20- 14 to have six game points. Though Sen saved one game point, the Chinese won the next one to pocket the first game in 17 minutes.
The second game was a closer fight than the first but the Chinese was leading all the time. Shifeng was ahead 8- 7 initially but the gap widened to 12- 7 before Sen made it 11- 14. The three- point gap remained for some time before the Chinese made it 18- 14 and then 19- 14.
Sen made a last- ditch effort to save the match by winning three straight points but Shifeng still made it 20- 17 to have three match points.
The India admitted to committing early mistakes and gave full credit to his Chinese rival. “He was very good and won the crucial points. I couldn’t push myself tough I managed to prolong the inevitable,” said Sen after his final.
“But I am happy to be the second Indian to bring back a medal in badminton from such an elite championship,” he added.
Hockey women enter semi- finals
The Indian women’s team notched up a comfortable 3- 0 win over Poland to enter the semifinals of the Hockey 5s competition of the Youth Olympic Games.
Lalremsiami ( 10th minute), captain Salima Tete ( 14) and Baljeet Kaur ( 14) contributed to the U- 18 team’s victory with a goal each at the Parque Polideportivo Roca.
Both the teams tried to get into the rhythm and find an opening to take the lead, but it was only in the last minute of the first period that Indian forward Lalremsiami made the breakthrough as she scored past Poland’s Nicole Chruszcz to give her team lead.
Poland looked for an equaliser the second period but India were too strong.