All England Open: Lakshya Sen crashes out, Ashwini-Sikki pair lose in quarters

Lakshya Sen crashed out of the All England Open Championships quarterfinals. (Source: Twitter)

Birmingham: Indian ace Lakshya Sen crashed out of the All England Open Championships quarterfinals after losing to Mark Caljouw of the Netherlands 17-21 21-16 17-21 here on Friday. The match, which lasted 55 minutes, saw the end of Indian challenge in men's singles.

The women's doubles pairing of Ashwini Ponnappa and N Sikki Reddy also bowed out of the tournament following their defeat in straight games to Netherlands' Selena Piek and Cheryl Seinen in the quarterfinals. The world number 30 Indian pairing went down 22-24 12-21 to 24th-ranked duo of Selena and Cheryl in 39 minutes.

Ashwini and Sikki had defeated 13th ranked duo of Bulgarian sisters Gabriela Stoeva and Stefani Stoeva 21-17 21-10 in just 33 minutes in the second-round match on Thursday night.

World number 10 men's doubles pairing of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty, seeded sixth, had crashed out of the event after losing 16-21 21-11 17-21 to Denmark's Kim Astrup and Anders Skaarup Rasmussen in the second round. 

It was their second consecutive defeat against the world number 13 combine, having lost to them at Swiss Open earlier this month.

In the men's singles, Sameer Verma too suffered a second successive loss to third seed Anders Antonsen of Denmark, going down 22-20 21-10 in the second round. The mixed pairing of Dhruv Kapila and Meghana Jakkampudi also bowed out after losing 19-21 8-21 to Niclas Nohr and Amalie Magelund of Denmark.

Caljouw, who had defeated Sen once before, claimed the first set 21-17 in 17 minutes. Sen, 19, bounced back in the second game, opening up a lead of 11-6 and later sealing it 21-16 to stay alive in the contest.

The world No. 36 Caljouw, however, won the last game 21-17 to clinch the match. Olympic silver medallist P V Sindhu will play her quarterfinal match against Japan's Akane Yamaguchi later on Friday.