The world junior number one jumped out to an early 11-4 lead in the decider, leaving fourth seed Anders Antonsen unable to rally.
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The big-name casualty in the opening round of the BWF World Tour Super 300 Orleans Masters on Wednesday (5 April) was Anders Antonsen. Alex Lanier, a talented young Frenchman, stunned the home crowd by defeating the former world number two from Denmark in three games, 21-12, 5-21, and 20-10, marking the biggest victory of his brief professional career. In 61 minutes, the 18-year-old won the match after bouncing back from a slump in the middle of it. The world junior number one jumped out to an early 11-4 lead in the decider, leaving fourth seed Anders Antonsen unable to rally. He did this by saving his energy when it was clear the second game was beyond him.
The European Mixed Team Championships 2023 are being held this week in Aire-sur-la-Lys in northern France, and Lanier, 18, is currently ranked as the top junior men’s singles player in the world. He will be competing alongside his senior teammates there. Following his parents, who played for fun, Lanier has been playing badminton since he was two years old. “You were around all the time when we were on the court when you were about two,” my parents told me, he recalled.
He found role models to base his game on and developed a passion for the sport during those 15 years. The young man responded, “Lin Dan of course,” when asked which players he looked up to growing up. My impression of him is that he possesses both power and “laziness.”
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Alex Lanier was born on January 26, 2005. At age 3, Alex Lanier began playing badminton and later joined the Dives-sur-Mer badminton club. To compete in the French interclub division, he left the Dives-sur-Mer club in 2019 and joined the club in Strasbourg. He joined INSEP in 2020 when he was just 15 years old.
He participated in the Lithuanian International tournament in June 2021, where he defeated Canadian player B.R. Sankeerth in the championship match to win his first international title. Then he was able to make it to the Latvia International final where he was defeated by Meiraba Luwang Maisnam of India. By defeating Czech player Jan Louda at the Italian International, he recovered and captured his second international championship.
He won the boys’ singles title at the 2022 European Junior Championships. At the age of just 17, he defeated Japanese player Takuma Obayashi at the Canada Open to earn his first victory in a World Tour competition. Time will tell what Lanier can accomplish, but this victory has the badminton community paying attention.
Lanier struggled through the qualifying rounds at the Slovenia International and Austrian Open to advance to the quarterfinals. In Lithuania, it was the same again, but he was motivated to take things a step further this time. Lanier modestly raised his arms in celebration to the sparse crowd after a whopping 280 minutes (more than 4 and a half hours) on the court, then went straight to the net to thank his opponent.
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