The Hindu : Sport / Badminton : Nationals from today

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Saturday, Jan 19, 2008
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Sport - Badminton

Nationals from today

S.R. Suryanarayan

PANAJI: It was in 1977 that this city had last hosted the senior national badminton championship.

Prakash Padukone won his seventh national title then, with Kanwal Thakur Singh winning her first in the women’s section.

Now, three decades later, as the same indoor facility at the Sports Authority of Goa (SAG) gets ready for the 63rd edition of the inter-state competition and 72nd edition of the open events to get underway on Saturday, old timers think of the past and are keen to get a sight of today’s champions.

The four Hova courts, all spruced up thanks to the efforts of the SAG, which has provided the main support for the Goa Badminton Association in organising this event are ready to take in the action.

For the next two days, the focus would be on the qualifying matches with the main players expected to be seen in action only when the inter-State competitions starts on January 21.

The next day is the final and Padukone is expected to be here as the star attraction.

The open events will begin on January 23 and the final is on January 27.

Tough field

Unlike in the early days when it was easy to pick on a favourite in the men’s and women’s sections, the competition these days has ensured this to be a difficult exercise.

In terms of achievements in 2007, Anup Sridhar stands tall for his quarterfinal entry in the World Championship.

But it was Chetan Anand who had clinched the national title last time around in Patna.

P. Kashyap, the National Games title winner, Arvind Bhat and Anand Pawar are the others who can be counted on to inject more than usual interest.

In the women’s section Saina Nehwal has been dominating like no other woman player did in India in recent times.

The Hyderabad girl, who won in Patna, promises much though players like Trupti Murgunde, Aditi Mutatkar, Dhanya Nair, Aparna Balan and the like have it in them to cause upsets.

The additional interest for this year’s championship is that the BAI will be selecting the Indian side for the All England Championship and the performance here will count.

Clear favourite

There is however none to look beyond the PSCB teams when it comes to picking the best in the Rahimtoola Cup (men) and the Chadha Cup (women).

They have been winning successively for the last eight years and Panaji should see one more encore.

The chief referee S. Muralidharan’s first job was to prepare the draw for the inter-state phase.

PSCB it he top seed in both sections.

Karnataka is the second seed in men’s category and Railways in the women’s section.

The other teams:

Men: BSNL, Assam, Maharashtra, Air India, UP, Punjab.