India’s men’s singles challenge at the Japan Open 2026 badminton tournament ended early after both Lakshya Sen and Ayush Shetty lost their first-round matches at the Tokyo Metropolitan Gymnasium on Wednesday.
Lakshya Sen, 14th in men’s singles badminton rankings, lost 21-16, 21-14 against world No. 17 Koki Watanabe of Japan.
The 24-year-old Indian badminton player struggled to find his rhythm, trailing 11-6 and 11-5 at the intervals in both games and was unable to mount a comeback in either, losing the contest in straight games in just 38 minutes.
This was Lakshya Sen’s third defeat in seven matches against the Japanese shuttler.
Ayush Shetty put up a stronger fight in his tournament opener but ultimately joined Lakshya Sen in making an early exit.
Up against world No. 2 Kunlavut Vitidsarn of Thailand, Ayush Shetty went down fighting 19-21, 25-23, 15-21 against the Paris 2024 silver medallist.
The opening game was a neck-to-neck affair with former world champion and Olympic medallist Kunlavut Vitidsarn holding a slim 11-9 cushion at the interval.
Ayush Shetty roared back to make it at 19-all but despite the late surge, Kunlavut Vitidsarn managed to edge the opener.
The second game saw Ayush Shetty lead 11-10 at the interval before the Thai shuttler switched gears to bring up four match points.
However, Ayush Shetty saved all four match points and held his nerve in the tie-break to force a decider.
Ayush Shetty then failed to carry his momentum into the final game as Kunlavut Vitidsarn sealed the contest and registered his second win in three encounters against the Indian shuttler.
Meanwhile, Unnati Hooda also lost her first-round women’s singles match 16-21, 21-16, 21-15 against Huang Yu-Hsun of Chinese Taipei.
Her exit leaves two-time Olympic medallist PV Sindhu and mixed doubles duo Tanisha Crasto and Dhruv Kapila as the only Indian badminton players remaining at the BWF Super 750 tournament.
Men’s doubles pairs Satwiksairaj Rankireddy-Chirag Shetty and MR Arjun-Hariharan Amsakarunan both exited in the first round on Tuesday.
READ MORE: https://www.olympics.com/en/news/japan-open-2026-badminton-india-day-2-report
