Reigning junior Asian champion Lakshya Sen takes on China's Li Shifeng in men's singles badminton gold medal match at Youth Olympics 2018 in Buenos Aires on Friday, October 11.
When does the match start and how to watch it online
The Youth Olympics 2018 badminton final will start at 3:30 pm local time, 12 am IST (Saturday).
There is no live television coverage of the matches in India. The live stream will be available on Olympic YouTube page and at Olympic Channel.
Youth Olympics badminton final preview
Sen is hoping to become the first Indian shuttler to win a Youth Olympic gold in what is expected to be a tricky test against lower-ranked (junior world number six) Shifeng.
The junior world number three is already assured of a silver — a feat achieved by HS Prannoy at the Singapore Youth Olympics in 2010.
The 17-year-old heads into the final on the back of a hard-fought semi-final win (14-21, 21-15, 24-22) against second seed Kodai Naraoka of Japan.
Sen dropped the first game only to stage a strong comeback in the second. The Prakash Padukone-academy ward had raced to an 11-0 lead in the decider but allowed Naraoka to make it 6-11.
It seemed all over for Naraoka when Sen made it 18-8 but a bizarre turn of events saw Sen fighting to save a match point at 21-22. The Indian shuttler was forced to make quite a lot of unforced errors as the Japanese shuttler found a fresh wave of energy.
Sen though would want to see Thursday's encounter as a good test ahead of the big final as he had eased his way to the last four.
The young Indian shuttler certainly starts as the favourite against Shifeng, who outclassed France's Arnaud Merkle in the semi-final 21-7, 21-12.
Notably, the junior world number three had beaten the Chinese shuttler in the quarter-final of Badminton Asia Junior Championships in July.
Sen has had more experience playing at the senior level and it should help him deal with pressure. The youngster from Almora had played the Thomas and Uber Cup for India earlier this year and came up with a valiant battle against Lin Dan.
