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Indians continue to live on hope

Rakesh Rao

In badminton and table tennis, India has never exceeded expectations

— Photo: Sandeep Saxena

PICTURE OF CONFIDENCE: India’s Sharath Kamal will bank on his intense international training to make an impact in the Beijing Olympics.

NEW DELHI: In most of the individual disciplines in the Olympics, an Indian qualifying either on merit or occupying a quota place reserved for the region itself makes news.

This is an achievement in itself since most of these Indian qualifiers realize their much-cherished dream of representing the country in the Olympic Games. Needless to add, a huge majority of these ‘Olympians’ make the field as participants and not as medal-contenders.

For a casual follower of Indian sporting fortunes, Olympics, Asian Games or Commonwealth Games are all barometers of the country’s medal-winning abilities.

When the eventual tally does not reach his rather unrealistic expectations, the question usually asked is, how come a country of over a billion people cannot produce champion sportspersons?

India’s eventual medal haul from the Beijing Olympics may well disappoint the vast majority of fans, but it is important to understand that barring shooting, boxing and to an extent archery, other individual disciplines including badminton and table tennis are not likely to see an Indian among the medals.

In badminton, Anup Sridhar and Saina Nehwal have reasons to be hopeful of winning a few matches.

Sridhar, who has career-victories over Athens Olympic gold medallist Taufik Hidayat and former All-England champion Hafiz Hashim, plays Portugal’s Marco Vasconcelos in the first round.

He has Japan’s Shaoji Sato, World No. 16, lined up next to build on 3-2 head-to-head advantage.

Sridhar’s problems

The 29th ranked Sridhar has looked more comfortable against the Asians than Europeans in the past season. He has the height, power and strokes to worry the best in the game. But it all depends on how quickly he recovers from the nagging ankle-injury.

Saina’s draw is to her liking with Russia’s Ella Diehl Karachkova in the first round. Should Saina cross the first hurdle, she will be up against either World No. 27 Ukraine’s Griga Larisa or the 55th ranked Italian Allegrini Agnese.

National coach Gopi Chand believes the Indians have it in them to challenge for a medal.

“Both Anup and Saina know how it feels to be playing the big names in the game. And in the 21-point format, I have seen pressure do crazy things to the favourites. Our players have everything to gain and nothing to lose. So expect some surprises,” says an optimist Gopi.

All eyes on Sharath

In table tennis, it will be a good learning experience for Neha, who is yet to break into the top-250 of the world, but Sharath Kamal is keen to make his presence felt.

“I have been preparing in Europe for the Olympics since April. I was training with the French team and Greek team. Having trained with Belgium’s Jean-Michel Saive and Greece’s Kalinkikos Kreanga, I think I’ve had one of my best trainings.

“Making the last-16 grade itself is very tough as I will have to beat at least two players from the top-50 bracket in three rounds. But should I continue to stay in shape, I am confident of making it. For me, it is quite realistic,” said Sharath.

Historically, in Olympic badminton and table tennis, Indians have never exceeded expectations.

Badminton: In 1992, Dipankar Bhattcharjee (third round), Vimal Kumar (first round) and Madhumita Bisht (second round); in 1996, Dipankar (first round) and P.V.V. Laxmi (second round); in 2000, P. Gopi Chand (quarterfinals), Aparna Popat (first round); in 2004, Aparna Popat (pre-quarterfinals), Nikhil Kanetkar (second round) and Abhinn Shyam Gupta (first round).

Table Tennis: In 1988, Kamlesh Mehta (won four out of seven league matches), Sujoy Ghorpade and Niyati Roy exited from the first stage.

In 1992, Kamlesh upstaged China’s Lu Lin but still failed to top the four-man group and qualify for the main draw. Chetan Baboor and Niyati, too, lost in the first stage.

Thereafter, Chetan and A. Radhika (in 1996), and Chetan and Poulomi Ghatak (in 2000) failed to get past the preliminary league.

In 2004, Sharath Kamal (second round) and Mouma Das (first round) joined the list of Indian Olympians in the discipline.

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