Indian Badminton Thread ...

[sameerph]

Lets us have a thread to discuss this .

[gautam]

The Indian men's have been struggling with their performance for the last one year and from having 2 players qualify for the men's singles, we barely ended up with one (Kidami should consider himself lucky as he has lot of points to defend over the next few months). Gopi should be held accountable and in case we fail to do well at the Olympics, we might require a change at the top

[arjun2761]

The top Indian would have qualified as long as they were in the top 30 or 40 or perhaps even lower. Top 16 ranking would allow 2 players to make it in, so we missed out on that opportunity as the remaining players were either injured or inconsistent.

[SaniaFan]

But is it mandatory that srikant is sent? I think it is is. This is not a country quota. But sadly he is the best indian player right now.

[arjun2761]

But is it mandatory that srikant is sent? I think it is is. This is not a country quota. But sadly he is the best indian player right now.

I don't believe it is mandatory that Srikanth be sent as I think several other Indians in the top-40 or so would also qualify. However, my understanding we can only send one entry among those that qualify. To get two entries, both of them have to be in the top-16, and two is the maximum entries any country can get.

[gautam]

The Indian pairing of Sumeeth Reddy and Manu Attri will be supported by the Pune-based sports NGO Lakshya in association with Narendra Firodia, General Secretary of the Ahmedanagar-located Shantikumarji Firodia Memorial Foundation. Good to see such support for our younger players.

[PKBasu]

The Rio Olympics have probably been the finest world badminton tournament ever for India, with PV Sindhu in the women's singles final, and Srikanth Kidambi losing the QF only very narrowly to the legend Lin Dan.
Today is perhaps the last chance for world #1 Lee Chong-wei (a notorious underperformer at the Olympics and world championships) to end his mainland China jinx at the big world events, and try beating Lin Dan in the SF (which will be 2 hours before Sindhu's final).

[sameerph]

London Olympics was not that bad with Saina winning bronze in womens singles and Kashyap reaching QF in mens singles.

But, it has gone 1 better this time and will hopefully go 2 better by evening.

But, badminton is 1 rare sport where we have better results than last Olympics .

I seriously hope that by Tokyo we will also become medal contenders in doubles rather then mere participants. There are 3 medal categories in doubles and a lot of opportunity there to pick up at least 1 medal.

[PKBasu]

Yes the hiring of Tan Kim Her as specialist doubles coach is a very good development. Doubles represents Low hanging fruit that we haven't plucked so far. Tan has now seen Gopi's training methods at close hand, and I hope he is just as rigorous in developing the best doubles and mixed doubles teams. He has a very good record with Malaysia.

[jaydeep]

Nice piece from “Pullela Gopi Chand: The World Beneath His Feat” ... Need to read this.

Wedded to badminton: Pullela Gopichand and the sacrifices he makes

[jayakris]

Hope everybody recognizes that it is Lakshmi who has made the greater sacrifices for the country, when we talk about the sacrifices Gopi makes.

[prasen9]

Yep. And also, to be world-class in anything, you need this type of dedication. There are no shortcuts.

[sportsfan]

btw P Kashyap has moved out of Gopi's academy to train with Tom John in Bangalore -
http://indianexpress.com/article/sports ... s-2994061/

[jaydeep]

He is training there for three months and then joining back to Gopi's academy.

[depleter]

We have a good set of juniors in men's singles with Lakshya Sen and Siril Verma looking the best of the lot.

15 year old Lakshya Sen(turned 15 on 16th Aug)
He won a bronze medal in the asian junior championships last month. Looks like the result is not posted here

SCG Badminton Asia Junior Championships 2016

Lakshya Sen [15] [Ind] - [Kor] Sang Min Lee - 21-16 21-9
Lakshya Sen [15] [Ind] - [China] Hongyang Weng -21-23 21-15 21-10
Koki Watanabe [3] [Jpn] - [Ind] Lakshya Sen [15] - 15-21 18-21 (won against last year world junior championship bronze medalist)
Lakshya Sen [15][Ind] - [Thai] Korakrit Laotrakul [6] - 16-21 21-12 21-19
Sun Feixiang [8] [China] - [Ind] Lakshya Sen [15] - 21-12 21-16 (lost to 18yr old eventual champion who won every match with relative ease)

and 16yr old Siril Verma is last year world junior championship silver medalist.