Sport - Badminton

Campers strike discordant note

By V.V. Subrahmanyam

HYDERABAD MAY 16. The ambience is quite familiar for the Dronacharya Awardee S.M. Arif and the All England champion Pullela Gopi Chand at the Fateh Maidan Indoor Stadium — venue for the Indian preparatory camp for the July Commonwealth Games.

Yet, after a one-hour brainstorming session with the trainees, the suave Arif was visibly perplexed when some of the players struck a discordant note. The players questioned the necessity for selection trials for them and wondered why they should not be selected directly to the national team. It took all the persuasive skills of the 57-year-old gentleman to put it across to them that it was not just performances, which have been topsy-turvy in most instances, in recent months at national and international level that would be considered. As such the trials were equally important, which meant that even some of the big names would have to undergo the three-day trials to prove their calibre under simulated match conditions. The team will be picked on May 22 by a six-member selection panel, headed by Dinesh Khanna.

At first there was reluctance on part of the outstation players to stay in the old Sports Hostel rooms, as most of them preferred to stay in a star hotel, and then this avoidable sense of uncertainty in the minds of some players. There have been murmurs that leading woman shuttler Aparna Popat had been given the permission to skip the camp and there is a general feeling that her mere presence would have helped the youngsters in the camp.

But, the 24-day first phase of the camp will go on despite the odd rumblings. All efforts are being made to ensure that this will not be one of the routine camps before a big event. The big difference being that this being a two-phase affair the coaches — Arif, Vinod Kumar and Leroy d'Sa — will get ample opportunity to make an indepth study on the strengths and weaknesses of the players to eliminate the negatives in their game once they take a break and return after taking part in tournaments like the Thailand and the Malaysian Opens, besides some domestic events.

"We never had this privilege earlier,'' said Arif. Essentially, the first phase will have greater emphasis on endurance, developing strokeplay and technique.

The mere fact that one of the big powers of world badminton, Malaysia, besides the very strong host, England, are also in the fray for the Commonwealth Games, the Indians' brains-trust is forced to plan a lot. As the Games feature a mixed format including three doubles — men's, women's and mixed doubes — the focus will be on finding the right combination. Clearly, there is all-round disappointment at the inconsistency of the highly promising doubles duo of Gutta Jwala and Shruthi Kurien. They are fast turning out to be a prime example of wasted talent. So, the doubles area is one where Vinod Kumar, who assisted one of the famed Sidek brothers, Raziv Sidek, at the Bangalore camp recently, and Leroy will be working overtime. In fact, things would have been better if only Sidek had not met with an accident forcing him to skip this camp. Or else, he was supposed to spend about a month focussing only on doubles.

One of the most redeeming features of the camp is the grit displayed by Arvind Bhatt, who has 16 stitches just below the right shoulder on the triceps. The final year Engineering student, armed with books to pursue his studies during breaks, is expected to be fit in a couple of days for serious practise and be in the reckoning for a singles slot after his impressive performances of late. Obviously, the 22-year-old Sachin Ratti, who beat Gopi Chand twice in recent important domestic events, will be the star to watch alongwith the never-say-die Abhinn Shyam Gupta.

Arif says that all Sachin has to do is believe in himself. "He has the game to beat anyone,'' he added.

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