All England Open: Lakshya Sen’s gritty 97-minute win over Groundhog Day retriever Victor Lai is an ode to the 21-point format

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Sen’s 21-16, 18-21, 21-15 victory over a Groundhog Day retriever – where a dozen 40+ shot rallies went on in a time loop – was an ode, a parting love letter to the 21-point format itself, which is in its last year at All England. In service of the 21-pointers Test of Endurance, Sen suffered, he hobbled in between two smashes, his legs folded like a literal buckle, the knee visibly looked like giving way, but he found it within him, to return outrageously impossible shuttles from various levels of imbalanced positions, before drawing out that last ounce of explosive power, to eke out a kill. And then one more. Over and over again.

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The first set – a neat 21-16 score – where Sen accelerated from 17-16 up, to race to next 4 points, carried no hints of what was coming next.

Lai – a Canadian of Hong Kong descent, coached by an expat mixed doubles lady shuttler in Ontario’s Mandarin Club run by a former Chinese Thomas Cup champions – isn’t an exceptional stroke-maker. What makes him extraordinary though is he can retrieve endlessly, without making a move to actually kill. A lot many of those retrieves, which go on at any pace the two players settle on, crucially tire out opponents. Even in the first set, till the last four point flurry, Sen wasn’t given a single rally where he could command a neat cut. He was made to labour on every return, though his effort-smashes weren’t lacking in punch. Lai simply chased down everything, till Sen charged the net and slashed like a sword.

Lakshya Sen will face Lin Chun-Yi of Taiwan in the finals. (CREDIT: Badminton Photo)

Lai allows opponents to settle into a rhythm of exchanges, not a rhythm of kills. It’s that sonorous harp, and he didn’t actually trouble Sen with his piercing shots, only by how often he sent back the blunt ones. From early in the second, the rallies went at an alarming rate – 59 shots as Sen trailed 4-8, then 67 shots at 10-13, 44 at 13-15 filled with defensive tosses and low lunge pick ups that the Indian won, then 49 at 18-20 where jaws dropped at Sen’s behind-the-back return but he still dumped one in the net. It might go down in history as the match with least errors per points played percentage. Neither blinked. A decider loomed.

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Because Lai defends so meticulously and it’s all he does at times, it’s easy to forget, that Sen was retrieving like a maniac to a point where his reflex shots that made highlights packages, became routine. Sometimes thrice in a rally.

At 6-5 in the third, both players pumped their fists convinced that a shuttle along the line after 77 minutes, had gone their way. Sen had earlier in the match loosened his laces to tend to a toe blister, but at 11-8 in the decider, after a series of contorted retrieves and tossathons, he hobbled with cramp, and was bluntly told, “Either you can retire or play on”. Incensed, not permitted medical treatment, that lactic acid roiling in his calves, he responded with a 354 kph scorching cross court smash. The match was in Laxman 281*, Sindhu-Okuhara 2017, Isner-Mahut territory. Sadly for Lai, Sen had transcended into Lama-realms, where he was not going to back off.

To reach 15-9, Sen hobbled in between two smashes in the same rally, where pristine power bookended a near rag-doll collapse. It happened again at 17-14, as Lai refused to fade out. It was excruciating because he didn’t have a decisive-kill either, so they just continued to thwack the shuttle, pummelling it in between the panting. Sen even snuck in a service fault amidst all this, deeply controversial, but yet another point adrift from the win. It was pure belief and refusal to lose that was pushing Sen into grazing greatness in the middle of gasps and legs that steadied to let him stand one moment more. A lesser player, would have thrown in the towel a dozen times in that passage of play.

Finally, when Sen reached 18-15, Lai smashed wide and then the Indian dashed to the net for a scythe, and at 20-15 sent a perfect high lift that Lai smashed into the net. It was a brutal test of stamina, where even applause stood still in awe, and Sen willed his legs to forget pain.

If it comes on Sunday against Lin Chun-Yi of Taiwan in the finals, this All England title would’ve taken 25 long years since India’s last. Those 97 minutes of a titanic tug of war in semis, felt like 25 years themself.