Junior world No 2 Lakshya Sen was among only three Indian shuttlers who progressed to the round of 16 of the BWF World Junior Championships in Indonesia on Wednesday.
The 14-year-old Gayatri Gopichand, daughter of India’s chief national coach P Gopichand, and 13th seed Kartikey Gulshan Kumar were the other two victors.
Eighth seed Aakarshi Kashyap, Ashmita Chaliha and Rahul Bharadwaj were knocked out in the fourth round.
Sen, 16, needed 36 minutes to get past China’s Li Shifeng 21-16, 21-11, while Kumar beat Canada’s Brian Yang 21-15, 21-12 after half an hour on court.
Gopichand had a much tougher outing as she had to come back from a game down to beat Denmark’s Michelle Skodstrup 19-21, 21-18, 21-17. Gopichand was trailing 13-16 in the second game before she launched a comeback.
Kashyap suffered a shock defeat to Vietnam’s Thi Anh Thu Vu, who beat the Indian in straight games 21-16, 21-18. Chaliha fought hard against ninth seed Chasinee Korepap of Thailand before going down 22-24, 21-19, 17-21.
Bharadwaj also stretched 11th seed Arnaud Merkle of France to three games before losing 19-21, 21-10, 14-21 in one hour and three minutes.
