Good afternoon and welcome to the Sportskeeda liveblog of the 2017 Senior National Badminton Championships semi-finals.
What a match this is! Top seed Srikanth Kidambi takes on 2016 runner-up Lakshya Sen for a place in the summit clash. It is the battle between the very best of two generations. Sen is very much primed to be the successor to the India No. 1 Srikanth.
He has shown enough potential for that. He has been the junior World No. 1 and already has two international titles at the senior level. He made it to the final last year and this year, he had a lead over the fourth seeded Ajay Jayaram in the quarter-finals when the latter called it quits due to discomfort in the heel.
Sen has all the tools to make it big on the circuit which makes this match so exciting.
Srikanth has been on a roll on the BWF Tour, winning Superseries titles like it is child's play. He has come to this tournament on the back of twin title triumphs at the Denmark Open and the French Open.
Tiredness, though, could be a factor that might make this a very competitive match. Srikanth did have trouble in his quarter-final match against Shubham Prajapati, who even held a couple of game points before the World No. 2 slammed shut the match in straight games. It remains to be seen if Lakshya too can similarly stretch Srikanth.
