The Olympic champions Viktor Axelsen and a Se-Young obtained respectively the crowned and female crowns with dominant victories in the LOP final to the India Open Super 750 Badminton tournament in New Delhi on Sunday. Axelsen, winner of 2017 and 2019, prevailed 21-16 21-8 compared to last year’s finalist, Lee Cheuk Yiu of Hong Kong during the confrontation of the Male Single Summit at the KD Jadhav Indoor Hall, which was almost full despite the fact that no Indian participates in the two finals.
Axelsen, a world champion twice, erased the disappointment to fall into the first round of Malaysian Open Super 1000 last week in the same opponent.
“To be honest, winning this title is very special for me. Because it was just a different feeling in the court and a different preparation. I am starting to have the impression that my motivation is back. I was competing this week,” Axelsen, who played in his sixth open India final in 10 years, told journalists.
“Since the Olympic Games, I have had a few problems with injuries. And that has affected my motivation a little. So being here now and winning the title means a lot.
“The first at 31. But again, as I also said in the other interviews, I was in my first final here 10 years ago, which is crazy. So many things have happened in the past 10 years. But it is very surreal to win this for the third time during my sixth final. It is incredible.” In simple feminine, it was another graceful performance of a Korea Se-Young, a champion in 2023, when she was effortlessly packaging Thai pornpawee Chochuwong 21-12 21-9 to win her second crown of Open India. She also reached the final last year.
The Malaysian combination of Goh Sze Fei and Nur Izzudding, which had ended the race of India Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty in the semi-finals, produced another superlative spectacle to exceed the Korean pair of Kim, the final of male doubles and Seo Seong.
In the final of the female doubles, Arisa Igarashi and Ayako Sakuramoto of Japan beat Kim Hye Jang and Kong Hee Young from South Korea 21-15 21-13. This is only the third tournament together for the Japanese combination with Igarashi, formerly known as Arisa Higashino, making a successful passage to the female doubles from mixed doubles.
In the final of mixed double, Jiang Zhen Bang in China and Wei Ya Xin prevailed 21-18 21-17 on the French combination of Thom Gicquel and Delphine Delrue.
Axelsen vs lee
Lee, winner of Hong Kong Open 2019, had finished as a finalist in the last edition and his dream of winning the title is not satisfied after having dropped in the final for the second time in two years.
Lee took a good start, opening an advance of 6-3. But Axelsen has regained his rhythm and slowly accumulate the momentum to collect an advantage of 11-8 at the break. Lee continued to fight, but could not constitute a real threat when Oxelsen dulled his attack with his recovery skills and took five match points and converted after Lee went for a long time.
The script has not changed despite the change of sides whilexlsen went from 10-6 to 19-6 with a series of booming smashs to dismantle Lee’s defense and fill the victory in no time.
(With the exception of the title, this story has not been published by NDTV staff and is published from a unionized flow.)
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