Young shuttler Lakshya Sen from Uttarakhand today achieved the World No. 1 ranking in the latest BWF World junior rankings.
The 15-year-old prodigy, who won the bronze medal at the Junior Asian Championships and clinched the All India Senior Ranking Tournament at Arunachal Pradesh last year, jumped one place to reach the numero uno status.
“Proud that OGQ has supported him since he was 11. OGQ has provided a full time physio and trainer only for Lakshya and he is on a special diet as well,” said Viren Rasquinha, CEO at Olympic Gold Quest and former India Hockey captain.
Sen, who hails from Almora district in Uttarakhand, has been training under the watchful eyes of 1980 All England champion Prakash Padukone at his Badminton Academy in Bangalore since he was 10.
In the senior circuit, Olympic silver medallist P V Sindhu resumed her World No 6th position, while Saina Nehwal, who had clinched the season-opening Malaysia Masters Grand Prix Gold, was at the 9th spot in women’s singles.
In men’s singles, Sameer Verma jumped 10 spots to be placed at 25th, riding on his maiden Grand Prix Gold title at the Syed Modi Internationals, but K Srikanth slipped out of the top 20 after suffering a quarterfinal exit at Lucknow.
Ajay Jayaram is now the best-placed Indian at World No 18, while H S Prannoy was at 24th. Praneeth, who reached the finals in Lucknow, jumped four places to reach the 32nd spot.
In mixed doubles, N SIkki Reddy and Pranaav Jerry Chopra, who clinched their maiden Grand Prix title at Syed Modi, jumped two places to World No 14, while Ashwini Ponnappa and B Sumeeth Reddy who stunned World No 4 Danish pair of Christinna Pedersen and Joachim Nielsen Fischer to reach the finals at Lucknow in only their second tournament together, jumped 379 places to be at 137th.
In men’s doubles, Manu Attri and Sumeeth dropped one place to World No. 23.
Feature image source: BAI Media