Kidambi Srikanth beats Lakshya Sen to enter final of BWF World Championships

(Source: Twitter)

Kidambi Srikanth beat Lakshya Sen in hard-fought three games to enter the men's singles final of the BWF World Championships.

Lakshya won the first game 21-17 after a stiff battle between the two. Kidambi was playing a catch up from the start but soon picked up the game to bring it to 17-17 but a one miss there and Lakshya ran away with the game. 

__#BWFWorldChampionships2021 #BWFWorldChampionships pic.twitter.com/knZQojkbT1 — BAI Media (@BAI_Media) December 18, 2021

Kidambi then channeled all his strength into the second game, winning it by a good margin of 21-14. It was a superb comeback considering he was trailing 4-8 at one stage. 

In the third game, it was neck and neck till the first eight points before Lakshya swelled the lead by 3 points. He led 11-8 at mid-game interval. Lakshya played well to win a 43-shot rally. Kidambi had to make a comeback and he soon upped his game after the break and took two back to back points. But a self forced error led to change of serve again and Lakshya got the chance to build on the lead. But it began to get closer with both players outdoing each other every alternate point. At 17-16 the game was poised when Srikanth, completely exhausted, began to use his brains and played lovely net game and smashes to widen the gap. 

It went down the wire and it was Kidambi, who despite running out of gas, held his nerves to win the third game 21-17 and the semi-final. He enters the men's singles final which will take place on December 19. 

What a match! Two warriors who gave it their everything on the court. Badminton won. India won. Congrats _@srikidambi_ and well fought _@lakshya_sen_. You guys have made India proud pic.twitter.com/IUH97nzeSr — Viren Rasquinha (@virenrasquinha) December 18, 2021

#badminton #BWFWorldChampionships2021 #huelva2021
Srikanth reaches his first world championship final after being pushed to the brink by Lakshya. Hard luck to the youngster but he played his heart out and the future is quite bright for him for sure. pic.twitter.com/BZYklbfbeG — Abhijeet Kulkarni (@abk6580) December 18, 2021

What a match .. @srikidambi @lakshya_sen . __ __

— Parupalli Kashyap (@parupallik) December 18, 2021

"Is Srikanth back? Really, really back?"

"_ I don't know.. I don't know, I have probably to see tomorrow" #BWC2021 #Huelva2021 pic.twitter.com/hbEgph2w6M — Vinayakk (@vinayakkm) December 18, 2021

At least in my memory, that's got to be the finest badminton match I've seen between two Indian players. Highlights package gonna have a tough time with this one. — jonathan selvaraj (@jon_selvaraj) December 18, 2021