All good things come to an end. Danish badminton star Viktor Axelsen’s epic win streak of 39 matches came to a close in his hometown, Odense, as Loh Kean Yew defeated him in straight games in the quarterfinals of the Denmark Open Super 750 on Friday.

The world No 1 was outplayed for the most part on the night, with Loh’s pace and movement proving too good. He won 21-17 21-10.

Loh, the 2021 World Champion, has now won his last two meetings against Axelsen. The last time they met was, in fact, at the 2021 World Championships in Huelva where Loh went on to create history for Singapore by going all the way.

“It’s a huge achievement to beat Viktor,” Loh was quoted as saying by BWF. “The shuttles were crazy fast and it was all about the net play. I used my speed and power to hit as fast as I could. It just wasn’t possible to control the shuttle speed.

“This is my first super 750 semifinal, so I’m just enjoying it.”

Axelsen, who recently in Tokyo won his second World Championship title, has now been beaten only twice in the entirety of 2022 in completed matches. The other defeat came against India’s Lakshya Sen at the German Open start of the year.

For his part, the world No 1 was looking forward to better in Paris for the French Open next week.

“We just became parents a few weeks ago, so now I can spend time with my girls before I get ready for the French Open. I didn’t expend too much energy this week, and I’m crossing my fingers I can do well in Paris,” he was quoted as saying by BWF.

Incidentally, both Loh and Lakshya have trained with Axelsen at various points in the Dane’s new base in Dubai.

On the women’s singles side, both Akane Yamaguchi and Tai Tzu Ying – the top two in the world – were defeated on Friday. While He Bing Jiao ended Yamaguchi’s tournament, Ratchanok Intanon made the epic Head-to-Head against Tai Tzu 15-18 in their 33rd meeting.