India’s No. 1 men’s singles shuttler, Lakshya Sen versus World No. 1 Viktor Axelsen of Denmark matches are becoming quite regular these days.
While the 20-year-old Indian’s 21-13 12-21 22-20 win over the 28-year-old Danish in the semifinals of the German Open in the week preceding the All England can be regarded as the youngster’s greatest win till date, his 10-21 15-21 loss in the All England title round on Sunday is a stepping stone to future successes.
“Viktor was strong for him today and definitely was superior,” Vimal Kumar told news18.com soon after Sunday’s final that lasted 53 minutes.
Kumar, a national selector and former head coach of the Indian team as well as a former Olympian, has been coaching Sen for the last 11 years from the time the youngster left Almora in Uttarakhand to join the Prakash Padukone Badminton Academy (PPBA) in Bengaluru.
Great rivals on the court, Lakshya and Axelsen are very good friends off it. At a time when Lakshya was deeply disappointed at not being selected for the Thomas Cup last year, there was a pleasant surprise awaiting him. It also helped him overcome the disappointment of being left out of the prestigious Thomas Cup and divert his mind away from it.
Kumar recalled the developments of last year: “When he was dropped from the Thomas Cup, he was very upset. He came here and exactly that day, Viktor Axelsen phoned him saying he has shifted base from Denmark to Dubai and asked him if he could come down to Dubai to practice together. Axelsen had also sent invitations to Loh Kean Yew of Singapore, Brian Yang of Canada, Toby Penty of England and Felix Burestedt of Sweden. Lakshya told me about the Axelsen phone call and I said, ‘you just go, don’t even stay here’. He’d have been so upset. He was continuing his training here at the PPBA but it could not have served anything. The best Indian player was dropped from the Thomas Cup team. This was an opportunity for him. He went to Dubai and trained with Axelsen for two weeks, and then the European circuit opened.
“I told him to go on his own and take up responsibility. He went on his own even prior to that when in 2019 Morten Frost was taking care of him (in the European circuit, especially in Denmark, where he spent three months under the European legend). After the Dubai stint last year, he managed all his matches without a coach or anyone and he did very well.”
Lakshya finished 2021 as a bronze medallist at the BWF World Championships in Huelva, Spain, and also as a semifinalist at the BWF World Tour Finals in Bali, Indonesia.
What changed Lakshya after the Dubai stint with Axelsen? Kumar said: “He was very impressed with the way Axelsen was managing his training sessions. Nothing was organised for him. He had to organise his own physio, he had to organise his gym sessions, plan everything, book the gym, etc. The Dubai ruler gave him the facility. He had to set up everything else. Axelsen had targetted young players (to be his sparring partners).”
The call from Axelsen came irrespective of the Thomas Cup debacle for Lakshya, and he has only become better since that.
Lakshya is on course to live up to his coach Kumar’s words. Kumar told this scribe four years ago that Lakshya Sen would be the next big thing in Indian badminton. He is only richer from experience with his two back-to-back runners-up finishes at the German Open, a BWF World Tour Super 300 tournament, and the All England, a BWF World Tour Super 1000 tournament.
Such has been the rise of Sen in badminton circles and the dedication to the sport that even during the Covid pandemic when everything was shut, Sen had his training going at the PPBA, which is currently housed at the vast Padukone-Dravid Centre for Sports Excellence (PDCSE) in Yelahanka, Bengaluru, not far away from the Bengaluru International Airport and about 25 km from the popular Cubbon Park.
Besides badminton, PDCSE also houses Dolphin Aquatics, where ‘Dronacharya’ Nihar Ameen trains swimmers including Olympians Srihari Nataraj and Maana Patel, cricket, 100m athletics track, tennis, volleyball, squash and basketball courts, football field of FIFA-approved standards and a 10m shooting range that was constructed out of a cricket storage space after India’s first Olympic individual gold medallist Abhinav Bindra requested for a facility for the refugee shooters prior to the Tokyo Olympic Games. These facilities are on land invested by Vivek Kumar of the Kirloskar family and a Karnataka State shuttler in his younger days. Vivek is also the co-founder of PPBA along with Kumar and Padukone.
PPBA has done wonders to the growth of Sen and other shuttlers after having moved out of its base at the Karnataka Badminton Association (KBA) premises in the heart of the city in March 2018.
For starters, the PPBA had five courts for its use at the KBA premises. The timings were restricted from 10am to 5pm. Now, with the move to the PDCSE, there are no restrictions as to the timings, the number of courts, etc. PPBA has 10 courts for its elite shuttlers and another six for the youngsters at the PDCSE. So, availability of courts for training at any time of the day or night is not an issue.
Secondly, during the pandemic, Sen had his training without a break that he could practice late in the evening or early in the morning with his practice partners and the coach as it was in an enclosed area. To make matters easy, Sen has even relocated his parents and elder brother, Chirag, also an international competitor, to an apartment about 3km from the PDCSE so as to focus fully on training.
“During Covid, we opened the courts for him during the night. He’d come and practice at night. He’d come and train at 4 O’clock in the morning. We’d open the academy only for him and his practice partners,” Kumar said.
Sen’s father, Dhirendra Kumar Sen, is also a coach at the PPBA and is currently accompanying Lakshya along with a Korean coach, Yong-sung Yoo (roped in by PPBA), and a physio Abdul Wahid (deputed by Olympic Gold Quest to take care of Lakshya), on the current European circuit that included the German Open and All England.
Lakshya’s entry into PPBA as a nine-year-old has an interesting tale to it. An official at PPBA who has been tracking Lakshya’s growth from the day he joined the academy, recalled: “Chirag Sen, the elder brother, was told by Prakash sir that he could join the academy. Lakshya, who had accompanied Chirag, started crying as he also wanted to join the academy. His parents asked Chirag if he could take care of the younger brother. Lakshya’s journey with PPBA began then.
“We had an apartment for our trainees nearby. Slowly. Lakshya started playing well and Prakash sir groomed his talent and was very confident that Lakshya would do well in badminton. Even in friendly matches, if Lakshya was trailing, he’d cry. Prakash sir would pacify him like he’d do to a baby. Lakshya never liked to lose. Lakshya on court is aggressive. Off the court, he is entirely different, a much disciplined boy, down to earth and humble. When Prakash sir and Vimal sir say something, he doesn’t cross the line. Their words are gospel to him. Success has not gone into his head, Prakash sir keeps talking to him about the same. We always have a constant check on him.”
Padukone, now-a-days, talks to Lakshya and other elite trainees at the PPBA occasionally, preferring to concentrate on the grassroots level.
Prior to joining the PPBA, Sen used to play badminton in Almora from the age of four, playing in tournaments and training under his father, Sen.
On what makes Lakshya standout from the rest of the PPBA trainees, Kumar said: “He grasps things very fast. We convey to everyone the same thing but he implements them when it matters. His pace is good. He can move quickly on the court. The backward movements and front, he can suddenly up the pace. And, I am not talking about sprints. The short bursts have a lot to do with technique, footwork. The only other thing is he dives a lot. For typical badminton, it is not required to dive. But he dives and recovers quickly. That is something very special about him. When you look at Lin Dan or Lee Chong Wei, they are steady, they don’t dive. Later for fancy, they dived and all these youngsters picked it up.”
Lakshya is destined for big things in world badminton in the years to come. Kumar added: “We always tell him to keep the rankings at the back of his mind. We tell him to win and try to become the best player that he can. Sometimes, after a match, we analyse his matches. More than that, he analyses his matches on his own and he is very clever. What I have seen over the years is that he has mentally become stronger and is playing a lot calmer and has developed good patience.”
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