Chief National badminton coach P. Gopi Chand feels winning only a few medals may not necessarily mean India will be a super power in sports.
“I feel only when every kid explores the boundaries when we ensure their basic needs are addressed so that they can enjoy and love any sport, we will achieve our objective,” Gopi said at a panel discussion on Roadmap for India to become a super power in sports, organised by Gaudium Sportopia Centre of Excellence, which aims at integrated approach to sports and academics.
“The kind of badminton courts the Gaudium Centre here has, I have not seen them anywhere in India. This kind of infrastructure in academics and sports should be provide to boys and girls in schools,” Gopi said.
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Renowned chess coach R.B. Ramesh, whose trainees include GM R. Praggnanandhaa, said parents push their kids far in their anxiety to see them become stars overnight. “There is a strong need to balance that point in grooming young talent. And in a way, any sport needs idols.”
Former National table tennis champion S. Raman, whose trainee G. Sathiyan is the biggest name from India now, feels the country badly needs infrastructure which can ensure excellence in academics and sports and that’s the reason Gaudium is one of the best things to have happened. “Yes we have talent, it is only a question of grooming it in the right manner,” he added.
India cricketer R. Ashwin felt no student studies mathematics to be a genius like the great Ramanujan or science to go to space.
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“Since there is no option, they study these subjects. I feel sports should be made compulsory in the school curriculum as a subject to unearth talent,” Ashwin said.
NBA Basketball Schools India technical director Leo Bruno felt there is passion everywhere but sports needs to be embedded in the education system like in the US to produce champions.
Sean Jamison of Wanderers Sports Medical Centre (South Africa), which will be involved with Gauium, said in his home country, sports unites people of different races and cultures like in India.
Mangipudi Prasad, co-founder of Sportzlive which organised the PBL, anchored the debate.
Kirthi Reddy, Director & Founder of Gaudium Sportopia, hoped that with the involvement of these illustrious sportspersons, her dream of producing Olympic medallists will be realised.