Lakshya Sen Leads India's Charge Amid Prannoy's Comeback in Japan

While Paris Olympic Games semifinalist Lakshya Sen will open his campaign against local star Koki Watanabe, Prannoy will take on Malaysia's Leong Jun Hao in the first round match in this Badminton World Federation (BWF) World Tour Super 500 event to be played at the Kumamoto Prefectural Gymnasium.

While Lakshya will be hoping to improve his chances of securing a berth in the BWF World Tour Finals, this will be World Championship bronze medallist Prannoy’s first competitive outing since suffering an injury during his first round match at the Korea Open back in September.

It has been a difficult 2025 season for the 33-year-old Prannoy as he has not advanced past the second round in any of his 14 appearances on the BWF World Tour in 2025, suffering eight first-round exits along the way.

Lakshya Sen, who sat out last week’s Korea Masters, will also hope for a good showing at the Kumamoto Prefectural Gymnasium over the course of the week to help his bid to qualify for the season-ending World Tour Finals.

Placed 13th in the Race to Finals rankings, Lakshya Sen is the only Indian singles player with a realistic chance of qualifying for the season-ending tournament, which will have the top eight players and doubles teams fighting for honours every year.

A good run at the Kumamoto Japan Masters will help Lakshya with valuable ranking points to climb up the rankings and get into contention for a place in the season-ender.

Lakshya has been enduring a mixed season so far with a handful of early exits punctuated by a few quarterfinal and semifinal appearances. His deepest run was at the Hong Kong Open, where he finished runner-up.

Ayush Shetty, who is the only Indian to win a BWF title this year courtesy his US Open triumph, is also in the men’s singles draw in Japan along with Kiran George and Tharun Mannepalli.

The 17-year-old Naishaa Kaur Bhatoye is the only Indian entry in women’s singles, playing the qualifiers that start on Tuesday, as two-time Olympic medallist P.V. Sindhu has ended her season early, and the likes of Anmol Kharb, Tanya Hemanth, and Shriyanshi Valishetty are also pulling out of the competition.

Naishaa, who played a young Saina Nehwal in the Olympic medallist’s Bollywood biopic titled Saina, has only appeared in two Super 100 BWF senior tournaments before this.

India will have no competitors in the men's doubles section with Chirag Shetty and Satwiksairaj Rankireddy pulling out from the tournament. The combination of Rohan Kapoor and Ruthvika Shivani Gadde is the country’s only challenge in the mixed doubles category.

- IANS