Courting excellence
Courting excellence
What was racing through Saina Nehwal’s head as she stepped on to the podium in London to become the first Indian badminton player to get an Olympic medal? “I was thinking of the years of work Gopi sir and I put in to get here," Nehwal says, “and I started crying."
Even as Nehwal, 22, made history, the man she says is the “most influential person" in her life, her coach and mentor Pullela Gopi Chand, was foremost on her mind. It’s not just Nehwal—compatriot Parupalli Kashyap, 25, also did better than any Indian badminton player at the Olympics before him, losing only in the quarter-finals to Malaysia’s World No. 2 Lee Chong Wei, who eventually won the silver. The reason for his success? “Gopi sir," he says.
“Gopi sir is here every day at 4.30 in the morning and he’s on court all day," Nehwal says. “I’ve never seen him leave here before 7 in the evening. He’s so dedicated and driven that players automatically give everything for him."
Nehwal’s dream of an Olympic medal, now a reality, was carefully nurtured and given shape and impetus here. Through good times and bad, successes and failures, the academy was the one constant that kept Nehwal’s engine running in the build-up to the London Games.
“Every day for the last six months, every time I climbed the stairs of the academy, I felt good, I felt happy," Nehwal says. “Every day I felt something good is going to happen. Few athletes in India can get to say that, and I know how lucky I am."
Nehwal simply calls the academy her “temple".
A month before the Olympics, Gopi Chand upped the training tempo for both Kashyap and Nehwal, introducing strategies that were carefully chalked out after monitoring the players’ progress through the year, and were designed to make them peak in London.
“I did everything Gopi sir asked of me," Kashyap says, “and immediately I felt the difference. In London, I knew that my game was better than ever before, and it showed in the result."
Every international player at the academy speaks of this faith they have in Gopi Chand’s methods. “It’s simple," Nehwal says. “He believes in me, and I believe in him." And that’s not just in training. Even during her matches, Nehwal says, when things start to move too fast for her to strategize effectively, she blindly follows the instructions Gopi Chand gives from the sidelines.
From king to king-maker
“All my life, my fight was more in finding the right facilities than in playing opponents," Gopi Chand, 38, says. “No electricity on court, or court is closed for no reason, there are no shuttlecocks, the coaches haven’t come, there’s no food. It was never about the game, it was just fundamental things."
So the quiet, unassuming man, who won the All England Open Badminton Championships in 2001 (only the second Indian to do so after Prakash Padukone in 1980), decided to make a difference on his own. In 2003, he managed to negotiate 5 acres of space from the Andhra Pradesh government. Then he went around looking for corporate sponsors, and eventually managed to get around ₹ 7 crore of the ₹ 10 crore he needed to build his academy. He mortgaged his house to make up the shortfall.
Even though the academy as it stands now was only completed in 2008, Gopi Chand had started training players from 2005 in a makeshift facility. Today the academy has eight international-standard courts, a weight room, a conditioning and aerobics room, a jacuzzi and steam room, an athletics track, a football field, a swimming pool, an equipment shop and repair centre, a canteen, and residential facilities for 70 players and coaches. By 2008, he had 60 trainees. Two years later, with Nehwal breaking through on the international scene and rapidly rising to a career ranking high of world No. 2, the academy was flooded with young aspirants wanting to join.
“We refuse 10 children a day," Gopi Chand says. “Till two years ago, we used to make a waiting list, but then we stopped because there were more than 200 people on that list. The problem is not with the demand for the sport, but that there’s not enough infrastructure to cater to that demand."
The academy now has 150 trainees under 14 coaches. A simple statistic highlights the pre-eminence of the academy in Indian badminton—all five events (men’s singles, women’s singles, men’s doubles, women’s doubles and mixed doubles) at the 76th Senior National Badminton Championships 2012 in January were won by players from Gopi Chand’s academy. Three of those finals were all-academy affairs.
“In a way it’s good," Gopi Chand says, “but also it shows us the responsibilities for the future because the Nationals are only a stepping stone for international success, and that’s what matters."
What’s he doing right to create so many champions?
“It’s just a lot of discipline and a lot of hard work and the right fundamentals," he says. “Everyone, from the coaches, the players, the support staff, down to the cleaning staff, has to put in the amount of work demanded of them. No one can laze."
It’s also smart training. Gopi Chand and his coaches constantly keep themselves upgraded with the latest training methods and developments, and they have a full-time sports analyst on board. “We have a structured training process, in sync with international standards, and we give equal importance to training, recovery, mental make-up, skills and strength," he says. “I read a lot, study international players when I’m on tour, and I’m constantly in touch with leading coaches and experts around the world."
Sourabh Verma, who is ranked 40 in the world and is the 2012 national champion, calls Gopi Chand “omnipresent". “He is at the academy before any player comes in," says 20-year-old Verma, who joined in 2008 after winning the Junior National Championships. “He is always watching, always thinking about you and pushing you in the right direction."
Gopi Chand believes India is on the cusp of becoming a badminton superpower over the next five years, but rues the lack of funding and management that is needed to make this happen. “Just look at our junior players," he says. “We’ve got a silver medallist at the 2010 Youth Olympics in H.S. Prannoy, (P.V.) Sindhu is just 16 and she won this year’s National Championships and Asian Junior Championships, and she’s already ranked world No. 26. In 2010, we had two players in the semi-finals at the World Junior Badminton Championships. Now, each of these players needs five-six years of great international exposure, focused individual training and attention. But we just don’t have the funds to do that."
But for the moment, the dream lives on.
“Gopi sir is already thinking of my next Olympics," Nehwal says. “I think he’ll still be getting up at 4 in the morning when he is 70 years old to push his players."
rudraneil.s@livemint.com
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