Lakshya Sen upset reigning world junior champion Kunlavut Vitidsarn of Thailand in straight games to become only the third Indian player to be crowned the Asian Junior badminton champion in Jakarta on Sunday.

The sixth seed, who had won a bronze medal in the last edition of the competition, got the better of Vitidsarn 21-19, 21-18 in 46 minutes to clinch the title.

Only Gautam Thakkar (1965) and PV Sindhu (2012) had won the prestigious title for India before. Sameer Verma had reached the boy’s single final in the 2011 edition in Lucknow but had gone down to Malaysia’s Zulfadli Zulkiffli in straight games.

Sen came into the final high on confidence having dropped just one game in the entire competition and maintained a very high tempo through out the encounter.

It was a neck-and-neck battle in the opening game till Vitidsarn opened up a 19-17 lead. However, Sen responded with a flurry of jump smashes to regain the advantage and mixed things up with a jump drop, which his opponent tried to judge, to draw first blood with four straight points.

Sen was first to get off the blocks in the second game and his down the line jump smashes were clearly making the difference. Vitidsarn did managed to fight back, catching his opponent on the wrong foot on a couple of occasions with his net flicks but the Indian ensured that he always stayed on the tail of the Thai top seed.

Vitidsarn then made two unforced errors — one with the tap on the net and other with a drop — to allow Sen to draw level at 17-17 and the Indian ensured that there was no point of return for the Thai.

Sen clinched five straight points to take a 19-17 lead and then clinched the title winner with another jump smash, this time opting for the cross court option.