Rising Indian badminton star Lakshya Sen rose one rung to his career-best ranking of 104th in the latest world rankings released by the Badminton World Federation (BWF) on Thursday, October 5, 2017.
The former junior World No. 1 has already started making his mark at the senior level and captured his second international career title at the Bulgarian Open in August. The Prakash Padukone Badminton Academy product followed it up with a quarter-final appearance at the Vietnam Open Grand Prix that pushed him up further in the ranking chart.
The 16-year-old will next be leading the Indian team at the BWF World Junior Mixed Team Championships 2017 that starts on October 9, besides setting his focus on an individual medal at the BWF World Junior Championships that is scheduled a week later.
Also read: 16-year-old badminton star Lakshya Sen clinches second senior title
Five Indians still inside top 20 of men’s singles
Among others, the top Indian shuttlers did not have any change this week. Five Indians still continue to be inside the top 20 of the men’s singles rankings, a record that they created last week.
Srikanth Kidambi stuck to his eighth spot, HS Prannoy remains 15th, Sai Praneeth is still 17th. Sameer Verma and Ajay Jayaram too are unchanged at 19th and 20th respectively.
Outside the top 20, Sourabh Verma is static at 33rd while Parupalli Kashyap maintains his 46th rank.
Subhankar Dey has risen one spot to 74th while Pratul Joshi has dropped to 84th. Former junior World No. 1 Siril Verma, who has been struggling of late, has slipped to 95th.
Also read: Which country has the most male shuttlers in the BWF World Rankings Top 100?
No change for Saina and Sindhu
In women’s singles, Korea Open champion PV Sindhu holds on to her second spot while Saina Nehwal continues to be 12th.
National champion Rituparna Das has dropped four spots to be 51st.
In men’s doubles, Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty are still the India No. 1 team with a world ranking of 32nd.
The 23rd ranked Ashwini Ponnappa and N Sikki Reddy are the numero uno pair from the country in women’s doubles. The mixed doubles duo of Sikki Reddy and Pranaav Jerry Chopra, who stole the show at the Japan Open Superseries by reaching the semi-finals, is unchanged at 17th.