It was an evening when four of the champion sportspersons – shuttlers Gutta Jwala, Ashwini Ponnappa, star cricketer Mithali Raj and Indian football captain Sunil Chetri – participated in a talk ‘India’s Potential as a Sporting Nation’ organised by the FICCI Ladies Organisation on Wednesday.
Formative stages
The talk essentially gave an insight and a recap of the way these champions struggled through their formative stages. Each one of them had a different story to tell, but one which clearly could prove to be an inspiration for all the budding young talent dream big.
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“We owe our success to our parents. But for whom, we would not have been here. Fortunately, they only insisted that we train hard, stay positive and never put pressure on winning. So, effectively, we just enjoyed our game over the years,” said both Jwala and Ashwani.
Exposure trips
“My career took off to a different level after 2009 when I started partnering Jwala for it gave me a stature in seniors’ category. We both play offensive game and complement each other pretty well. Importantly, the goals are the same for us – to bring laurels to the country,” chipped in Ashwani, to make a point.
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Jwala felt that they were successful despite the lack of proper sports structure even though they were grateful to the Government of India for taking care of all their exposure trips.
“But, we often feel there should be some accountability on this front and this is where the Associations disappoint,” the flamboyant shuttler said.
For his part, Sunil Chetri differed stating that All India Football Federation did what best it could to support the footballers cause.
“I look at this way. You don’t plan to become a Jwala or an Ashwini or a Mithali. You have to change your style of preparations and keep changing your goals as the situation demands,” he pointed out to a query from the ladies.
“It is imperative to love what you want to do,” he added.
Mithali recalled her struggle when many looked down at her in a male-dominated cricket.
“In a way, I am lucky that my parents protected me really and set up a wall which could block all hindrances, emotions and let me stay focussed,” she said.
“Yes, I would love to see Inter-schools cricket for girls to nurture future talent,” she remarked. She revealed that she was actually coaxed to play cricket being a ‘lazy girl’ as the parents wanted her initially to give company to her brother who played Grade II level cricket. And, all four star athletes were clear India needs a sports structure.
“We need a system to take care of core areas – training, exposure and proper monitoring. It is always easy to say India fails to produce even a couple of world or Olympic champions. But tell me how many of the millions of kids get proper training,” was Chetri’s poser.
Former Ranji cricketer Vijay Mohan Raj was the moderator for the programme.
We need a system to take care of core areas — training, exposure and proper monitoring.
Sunil Chetri
The ‘fab four’ give an insight into their years of struggle and call for improving the present sports system