Lungs of iron. Nerves of steel. Guts that won't give up. Throw in all the clichés you want, Lakshya Sen has got them all. It's been a 21-year wait for an Indian man to step into a final at the All England. He's here. On Saturday, Lakshya took down defending champion Lee Zii Jia, 21-13, 12-21, 21-19 in an epic semifinal.
After a comfortable first game, he was run ragged by Zii Jia in the next. The Malaysian dispatched him to all corners of the court, sending him bending, chasing, panting, testing his legs and patience. The Indian's touch at the net floundered and he gave away a bunch of points to lose the game easily.
And, until the midway point of the decider it looked like Zii Jia was safe behind the wheel and heading home. Until Lakshya did Lakshya things. Like turning desperation into belief, and an unfavourable scoreline into a certain win. Here's how those dozen-odd points played out.
Lakshya is trailing, he's just gifted a short lift to Zii Jia - world No 7, towering at the other end in his sleeveless shirt. The lift has enough angle options for the Malaysian to put away. There's nothing he loves more. With a hint of a smirk he smokes it across, a 397 kmph winner. 12-16. A handy four point lead. Zii Jia looks smug, he swivels away from the net, looks at his coach and slow-pumps both his arms in celebration.
The Indian admonishes himself for the error. The net must be brought back into play, he tells himself. He lures his opponent with a tight spinning net shot, the Malaysian responds with a loose lift that balloons wide of the sideline on Lakshya's backhand side. Lakshya's smelled an opening here. He sets up another net duel, this time Zii Jia's forehand dribble refuses to go over. 13-16. Lakshya is now talking to himself. It's only three points, he's scaled higher barriers before. The lead is under threat.
Zii Jia's temperament slides from rampaging to tentative. He tries to force Lakshya away from the net, but fails. Zii Jia crashes two successive returns into the net, and pushes Lakshya into his deep forehand pocket. Lakshya responds with a cross court that dunks itself into the net. Zii Jia believes he's back, and nods to himself.
The net returns into play. Lakshya picks up a tight spinning net shot from Zii Jia at the bottom end of the net, and holds it for a nanosecond and pretends he's about to lift. The Malaysian loosens his focus from the net, moves two steps back expecting the shuttle to sail over, and just then Lakshya scrapes the shuttle over the net, sending it trickling down. The Malaysian scrambles, takes a one-step lunge, tries to get his racket under but it's gone. Lakshya now one point away, 16-17. Zii Jia can't believe how he's been deceived.
But it's not over. Zii Jia sends a return skimming the backline to pick up a point; Lakshya closes down the net and draws level with a hop-skip kill. 18-18. Their body language is disparate. Lakshya rushes forward to set up attacks, leaving Zii Jia to find answers to them. One growing in belief that he can see this off in the clutch, the other not so sure of what he's up against anymore.
Zii Jia leaks a point again at the net, his reflexes are shaky, and Lakshya has him in his grip. Lakshya puts away a flat drive from the net, while his opponent, stranded miles away, swats at the air to bring up match point. A return that goes long hands the serve back to Zii Jia, who pushes Lakshya to the back of the court. The Indian pulls the punches close together - a smash followed by a rushing kill and the already-harried defending champion is gob-smacked. His campaign has ended a day early and he probably didn't quite see it coming.
The manner in which Lakshya turned around the third game from 12-16 down, with his street smarts and a cool head, is testament to his growing reputation of tenacity and resilience. He will now play either Viktor Axelsen or Chou Tien Chen for the title. He beat one of them last week and has never faced the other before. For a 20-year old who began carving his way on the pandemic-truncated tour only two years ago, the last six months have been an almighty hustle - he's broken into the top 10, taken down a bunch of fearsome names and counting this week, has five top-three finishes from four months.
Pullela Gopichand was the last Indian to bring home the All England trophy in 2001.
No matter what Sunday holds, tonight Lakshya will be dreaming with eyes wide open.