Lakshya Sen, Priyanshu Rajawat, Kidambi Srikanth Get Knocked Out In First Round Of China Masters

In what was a poor outing for Indian shuttlers at the China Masters, men's singles shuttlers Lakshya Sen, Kidambi Srikanth, and Priyanshu Rajawat, besides women's doubles duo of Rutuparna and Swetaparna Panda succumbed to first-round defeats. Three of India's prominent badminton players, Lakshya, Srikanth, and Priyanshu, faced losses in their respective first-round matches, marking a bad day for Indian badminton fans at the China Masters.

This was Lakshya's seventh consecutive first-round exit on the BWF World Tour, after having lost to Kodai Naraoka at the Kumamoto Masters.

Lakshya was unable to overcome the challenge posed by seventh-seed Shi Yu Qi in what was their first meeting on the tour. The match was a closely-contested one with the Indian shuttler losing 19-21, 18-21 in a 59-minute affair.

After winning the second game, Srikanth couldn't maintain his momentum and lost the match against fourth-seed Kunlavut Vitidsarn 15-21, 21-14, 13-21 in an encounter that lasted just over an hour. It was a hattrick of first-round exits on tour for Srikanth, who also has four quarterfinal finishes this season.

He lagged behind in the opening game from the beginning as Vitidsarn bagged an 11-6 advantage at the interval. Srikanth narrowed down the lead to 12-13 but Vitidsarn moved ahead to win the opening game.

In the second game, there was a tight fight but the Indian shuttler managed to establish a 13-10 advantage after the interval and kept his distance to make it 1-all. But Vitidsarn didn't let Srikanth maintain the momentum and took the decider 21-13.

Going by the current form, it will be extremely tough for Lakshya and Srikanth to qualify for the Paris Olympics next year. While Lakshya still has a chance, Srikanth's opportunities are waning by the day.

Priyanshu played against Kenta Nishimoto and was beaten in straight games, 17-21, 14-21 in just 46 minutes.

The sister duo of Rutuparna and Swetaparna went down in straight games to the third-seeded pair of Zhang Xian and Zheng Yu.