Three-time medallist at World Championship, Denmark’s women’s doubles star Kamilla Rytter Juhl feels Indian doubles shuttlers spend too much time training on the court and it affects their intensity during matches in international tournaments.
“It is about having the right focus at practice. In Denmark, we are really good at having practised for two hours and then trying to do our best on court,” Kamilla told PTI when asked why Indian shuttlers have struggled so far in doubles category.
“I have the impression that in Asian countries, like India, they are on court for many, many hours and then the level may go down because it is not easy to keep the intensity high for so long.
“We train against two of the boys because we are the only women’s pairs at this level. If there were another pair then we could have trained with them. So we train with the boys and it helps to feel the pressure,” she added.
Kamilla clinched the 2009 World Championship title along with her mixed doubles partner Thomas Laybourn, before bagging the bronze and silver in 2013 and 2015 editions respectively along with women’s doubles partner Christinna Pedersen.
The 32-year-old from Skagen is now training her eyes on the All England Championship next month and the Rio Olympics.
“All England is one of the most important tournaments which we are looking forward to. It is a special event for us and also Olympics this summer. I am playing the ladies doubles so hope to win this title this year or may be the year after,” said the tall shuttler who twice finished runners-up at the All England Championships in 2005 and 2012 with Laybourn.
About preparation for Olympics, she said: “It is going on well. We are looking to have the same training like we did last summer before the World Championship. We did well there and we want to copy that for this Olympics.”
Kamilla, however, said she is not confident about her chances at the Olympics.
“I am actually not confident at all. It is extremely difficult to win a medal at Olympics. Of course, I will try my best. It is about having the perfect week when the Olympics starts. Now we are just looking to train well and see how it goes during Olympics,” said Kamilla, who is ranked fourth in the world along with Pedersen.
“I think the competition is very strong. I think China, Korea and Japan will have two doubles pair coming to Olympics and we are just one pair from Denmark who would be trying to win a medal and overall I think our level is higher than the last time,” she added.
Talking about China, Kamilla, won the 2008 BWF Super Series Masters Finals with Laybourn, said: “I still think China will have the dominance because they have so many individual players, they can mix them around. May be they mixed it around too much this time that made the dominance a little lower at the moment.”
