A seemingly refreshed Deepika Kumari has returned to the national team that will take part in the May 13 to 18 Stage 2 World Cup. This comes a month after she missed the World Cup in Shanghai, an event where the Indian archers drew a blank.
In fact, Deepika had been insistent on training with her old coach for sometime now. But it wasn’t easy to give the national camp a miss. Still, she insisted on having the comfort zone of a familiar training routine as she was confident that Tiwary would surely mend her. He didn’t disappoint as he found a major flaw that was responsible for the form slump of his old ward.
Deepika’s anchor position needed to be realigned. The fully drawn bow-string, just before it was released to fire the arrow, didn’t rest of the face as it once did. As a matter of habit, archers place the string on either their mouth, chin or nose. But a string of poor results can see the anchor position change. Early in her career, Deepika had faced a similar problem but Tiwary was at hand to point out the mistake and rectify the error. At the national camp, while dealing with self-doubt, Deepika mixed up her stance.
This isn’t the first time that a big-time player has returned to his old coach to revive floundering career. Virender Sehwag, while in the middle of a run-glut during the last decade, had returned to his trusted aide, A N Sharma. Going back to the basics had worked for him. Deepika will be hoping she too finds her form after the help from an old hand.
Vinayak is a principal correspondent, based in New Delhi.
vinayakbhushan.padmadeo@expressindia.com
