The Hindu : Chetan ready to write a new script

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Jul 04, 2003

Sport

Sport - Badminton

Chetan ready to write a new script

By V.V. Subrahmanyam

The talented but erratic Chetan Anand is aiming to erase the impression of being an easy-going shuttler. — Photo: Ch. Vijaya Bhaskar

HYDERABAD July 3. For quite long, he has been tipped to be a potential champion at the highest level but never really scaling the summit when it mattered most.

He has been rarely consistent in tune with his original, stylish game which could have taken him to places on the international circuit. However, the 23-year-old Chetan Anand is now determined to change all that.

Despite abundant talent, this graceful shuttler from Vijayawada, surprisingly, never gave the impression of being serious about the sport. Somehow, Chetan always seemed to be content in going out there and playing his normal game.

Critics point out that he still makes the cardinal error of conceding too many negative points in crunch time. If only he had shown the commitment and determination of 2001 All England champion, Pullela Gopi Chand, this handsome player, who just finished his Mechanical Engineering from Nagarjuna Institute of Technology, would have been the cynosure of all eyes in Indian badminton.

But, Chetan is now in the mood to write a new script. More importantly, he is all set to leave for Australia and New Zealand to play in the IBF ranking tournaments to pick up some vital points to improve his current world ranking of No. 89 and gain a berth in the 2004 Athens Olympics. "That is my target now and nothing else will satisfy me,'' he says with a rare zeal.

Clearly aiming to erase the impression of being an easy-going shuttler, Chetan is confident that his three-month long training session with SAI coach U. Bhaskar Babu here would pay dividend.

For someone who is really good at the net, Chetan is gearing up to speed up his backcourt game. "I have had some problems in adjusting to the speed of the Europeans. So, the focus on training was on this aspect,'' he points out.

Chetan, who finished runner-up to Abhinn Shyam Gupta in the last Senior Nationals despite levelling the scores at 13-all in the decider, badly feels that he needs a couple of quality practice partners. "It is not that things would improve overnight if I train with Gopi alone. But, what I mean is most of us generally believe that some sort of regular exposure to foreign circuit would be very helpful,'' he says.

The Hyderabad National Games gold medallist, who first made a mark at the national level winning the juniors title in 1999, has also chalked out plans to participate in the Asian circuit later this year. He says that there is nothing wrong with his SAI coach but a three-month training stint with the Indian coaches accompanying the players would be a worthy experience.

The ONGC employee is aware that this year could well make or break his career. Valuable words of advice from the great Prakash Padukone and Vimal Kumar at the former's Academy in Bangalore during Chetan's visits have only rekindled his confidence.

The winner of the Asian Satellite championship in 2001, Chetan Anand is always synonymous with style. There is no doubting that on his day, he can beat the best in the Indian circuit. And in fact, he has the distinction of beating all the higher ranked Indian players in recent times which fetched him two Major ranking titles.

What does his coach has to say? "There is no problem with his game. He badly needs a good break in a big tournament and then things will fall in place,'' says Bhaskar Babu, who first spotted him when the kid was dabbling with a racket. His father, Harshavardhann who was then playing just to keep himself fit, got him admitted to the SAI STC in Vijayawada in 1992.

The coach also says that the training schedule was planned in such a way that it did not upset his natural rhythm and style but with emphasis on physical conditioning, strength and speed. "Self-belief is what he badly lacks. We are trying to drill home this vital thing,'' says Bhaskara Babu.

Chetan, whose best show outside India was the semifinal appearance in the 2001 Dutch Open, is keen to break into the elite group and carve a niche for himself.

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