File image of Kidambi Srikanth© AFP
India’s ace shuttlers Kidambi Srikanth and Lakshya Sen bowed out of the French Open Super 750 tournament after losing their respective men’s singles matches Rennes on Wednesday. The first to take to the court at the Glaz Arena was Srikanth, who was shown the door by Toma Junior Popov of France. Srikanth lost the round of 32 match 17-21 15-21 in 44 minutes. It was an easy victory for the world number 25 French player as he punished the 22nd ranked Srikanth for his error-prone showing. Heading into this match, Srikanth had a 3-1 advantage over his opponent in head-to-head.
Soon after, it was Lakshya’s turn to suffer as he went down 15-21 18-21 to Arnaud Merkle, who is also from France and had lost to the Indian in their last meeting way back in 2016 when they were competing in juniors.
However, this was their first meeting on the BWF World Tour.
Lakshya lost his match in 55 minutes after appearing to stage a comeback of sorts in the second game when he led the Frenchman for a good part.
It turned out to be a forgettable day for the Indian squad as both their established stars went down in straight games.
The two badminton stars were coming here after suffering early exits in last week’s Denmark Open.
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