BAI junior promo starves seniors

The Badminton Association of India (BAI) will draw up its calendar on May 9, but one decision has already been taken. They will not be sending the senior women players to upcoming international tournaments, something that was reported earlier in The Indian Express.

The Badminton Association of India (BAI) will draw up its calendar on May 9, but one decision has already been taken. They will not be sending the senior women players to upcoming international tournaments, something that was reported earlier in The Indian Express..

Instead, the juniors will be making the trip to the Philippines Open, the Indonesian Open and the Singapore Open, while the likes of India No. 1 Trupti Murgunde and No. 3 Aparna Popat will have to fend for themselves.

What is strange is that the senior men will be going, but not the senior women.

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Interestingly, in the latest world rankings released, Trupti is at 86, Saina Nehwal is at 87 and Aparna is at 88, a rare instance indeed. Trupti and Aparna are desperately looking for sponsors to finance their trips, while Saina, with the backing of Mittal Champions Trust, has been practising for a couple of weeks now and could well be the new No. 1 in the country by the turn of the month.

That’s because she will be the only one among the trio to be playing tournaments and even though the Philippines Open in two weeks time may be cancelled due to lack of sufficient entries, Saina will have her chance at the Indonesian Open to get to the top.

Like Saina, Trupti too was keen on taking part in the above tournaments, but has decided to prolong her training period for lack of sponsors. It has really hit her hard: from 64, she has dropped 22 places.

She won points in victories last year at the Kenya International followed by her unbeaten run in the Sudirman Cup. But she has failed to defend those points.

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The BAI’s logic of grooming juniors for the future has not cut much ice among the top women. “It’s good that they are giving exposure to the juniors in such big events, but isn’t it too premature? I’ve heard that they have the 2010 Commonwealth Games and the 2012 Olympics in mind, but then there are also three world championships and two Uber Cups in between.

“Inevitably, it will be the seniors who will be called to bail the country out in these tournaments,” said a top woman player.

Gopi wards for London heist

Kolkata: Five years after winning the All-England title, Pullela Gopichand has now set his ‘sights’ on the 2012 London Olympics. The shuttler is on a mission to produce a world class Olympic medallist for India in badminton. Gopi recently met BAI president V K Verma to chalk out a blueprint. He wants the grooming process to take place at his academy in Hyderabad. Ten 15-18-year-olds will be handpicked from across the country to train at his academy for the next six years, until the London Olympics. The initial phase of recruitment will be done on a wide scale, starting with the two national ranking meets in Kochi from June 5-11 and in Chennai from June 12-17. —JS

jaydip.senguptaexpressindia.com