The Hindu : Sport : Chetan, Jwala, Shruthi attend camp

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Thursday, Jun 21, 2007
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Chetan, Jwala, Shruthi attend camp

V.V. Subrahmanyam

HYDERABAD: There were a few awkward moments when shuttlers B. Chetan Anand, doubles pair of Gutta Jwala and Shruthi Kurien walked into the Gachibowli indoor stadium, the venue of the 10-day national camp, here on Wednesday.

They had earlier been excluded from the national squad following their refusal to join the national camp. But they changed their minds and joined the camp on Wednesday.

After a few minutes however, Jwala took a long break from training explaining she was not well but had to come since this was the first day.

While chief national coach Gopi Chand concentrated on Shruthi and Saina Nehawal, Chetan and Jwala trained under their personal coach Goverdhan. It was not an ideal beginning but Gopi Chand was guarded in his reaction. “It is too early to say anything. Let us wait and see,” he said.

Own training

Both Chetan and Jwala insisted that they will stick to the training programme which they have been following for more than two months under S.M. Arif and Goverdhan.

“We had a chat with Gopi and told him that we will stick to our own schedule with our personal coach monitoring it,” they told The Hindu after their first session.

“I hope everything will go smoothly as was promised to us before we joined the camp,” said Jwala. On picking sparring partners, Jwala said it would not be a problem as Gopi conveyed to them that whomever they wanted to train with, will be made available.

The five-time national doubles champion, however, asserted that she would not even think of anyone else as her doubles partner.

“That question does not arise. If Shruthi is not available or unwell, I prefer not to compete,” she said.

“Personally, I enjoyed the training here. We don’t have any thing personal against anybody. The games sessions will be held with other players and the training programme will be monitored by Goverdhan,” she said.

Incidentally, only these three from India will take part in the Chinese Super Series event in the second week of July. From there, they will fly to take part in the Thailand and the Philippines Open.

“Essentially, it is only a change of venue for us and the training is the same. I don’t think there will be any problems because of us,” Chetan said.

As for Gopi Chand, they said, “if we need any help we will always approach him.”

Jwala added “for us (doubles pair) the new qualification mark for Beijing Olympics means that we have to be ranked in the top 16 in the world. So we badly need to take part in as many events as possible to break into that elite group and it wont be easy.”

“It was disappointing to miss the Sudirman Cup. I feel our presence could have produced better results. I don’t say that my team-mates underperformed. But I love it when Indians do well,” he said. “Anyhow, we are mentally tougher now,” he added.

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