Indian badminton legend Prakash Padukone feels Saina Nehwal has achieved more than Sania Mirza vis--vis performance because of the fact that she has beaten more higher-ranked players than the tennis ace.
Saina Nehwal scripted history on Sunday, becoming the first Indian to win a Super Series tournament after clinching the Indonesian Open with a stunning victory over higher-ranked Chinese Lin Wang in Jakarta.
London Olympics bronze-medallist Saina Nehwal resumed training at a separate facility in Hyderabad after the COVID-19-induced break and is likely to join the national camp at the Sports Authority of India-Pullela Gopichand Academy in a couple of weeks.
Badminton legend Prakash Padukone discusses India's prospects at the Beijing Games.
The hype around tennis ace Sania Mirza may be bigger but ace shuttler Saina Nehwal clearly has the edge in terms of performance, feels badminton legend Prakash Padukone.
Ace woman shuttler Saina Nehwal scripted history on Sunday, becoming the first Indian to win a Super Series tournament after clinching the Indonesian Open with a stunning victory over higher-ranked Chinese Lin Wang in Jakarta.
While praising the depth in the Indian men's ranks and expecting it to last for the next 10 years, badminton legend Prakash Padukone lamented that the women's side did not possess the same depth in class after world no. 2 Saina Nehwal and no. 12 P V Sindhu.
Beijing Olympics-bound shuttlers Anup Sridhar and Saina Nehwal's participation in the first Tata Open badminton tournament, to be held in Mumbai, from July 27-31 is in doubt. While the former is nursing an injury, the latter is still to confirm her entry.
Saina Nehwal is a 'champion material' and in another three years, India can look forward to seeing a world number one in the Hyderabadi youngster, said legendary shuttler Prakash Padukone. Padukone, a former All England champion, pointed out that 17-year-old Saina has most of the qualities a champion needs -- physical, technical, mental and self-belief.
Legendary shuttler Prakash Padukone feels Anup Sridhar is one of India's best bets to win a medal at the Beijing Olympics. The Bangalore lad will be the country's lone men's singles challenger at the prestigious quadrennial event in Beijing.
Wrestler Sushil Kumar, who won a bronze medal at the 2008 Beijing Olympics and silver at the following Games in London, has signed up with Olympic Gold Quest, which will provide him training and financial assistance in his preparation for the 2016 Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
P Kashyap insisted that he too has an outside chance of qualifying for the Tokyo Games but he has no way to pursue it as he can't train at the camp.
Badminton ace Prakash Padukone held out reasonably good hope for India's Beijing Olympic hopefuls Anup Sridhar and Saina Nehwal, saying their task of climbing the medal rostrum is difficult but not impossible.
Prakash Padukone and Geet Sethi have joined hands to launch the Olympic Gold Quest Sports Foundation.
She is inching closer to being among the world's top five and is tipped to be number one in the next couple of years but ace Indian shuttler Saina Nehwal says being numero uno is still a very distant dream.
Anup Sridhar won the men's singles title in the National Badminton championships.
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India's chief national badminton coach Pullela Gopichand on Friday admitted that it was tough for him to manage two of his illustrious wards Saina Nehwal and PV Sindhu together, saying he could never pick a favourite between the two. Gopichand said he always saw the duo as his kids and felt bitter when Saina left his academy to join Prakash Padukone's academy.
Cricket legend Rahul Dravid reckons there could be "a sense of doubt, hesitancy and fear" initially in the minds of athletes, as well as people in general, when sport resumes in the post coronavirus pandemic world. The novel coronavirus pandemic has led to either cancellation or postponement of all sporting activities worldwide, including the Tokyo Olympics.
The debate on scheduling kicked off after the legendary Prakash Padukone recently observed that the Indian players were "definitely playing more tournaments than required".
Former Indian badminton ace Prakash Padukone will play in the the Legends Badminton Masters Reunion in Jakarta on Saturday.
Gopichand also wondered to why the legendary Padukone, India's first badminton superstar 'never had anything positive to say about him'.
Asked about Saina Nehwal, whose 2012 London Games bronze medal winning show was a path breaker for Indian women's badminton, Padukone is confident that the 26-year-old former World number one will be regain her best form.
The former All-England badminton champion says he was in the dark about the formation of new Arjuna Awards panel.
Saina Nehwal is better equipped to win a medal in Rio in August than the Indian shuttler was when she claimed a bronze at the London Olympics four years ago, former All England champion Prakash Padukone said.
Expressing hurt over "lack of commitment" by some of India's top shuttlers, legendary badminton player Prakash Padukone has called for strict measures.
The rising Indian star went down fighting to Germany No 3 Jens Roch in the pre-quarter-finals of the tournament.
Teenage shuttler Lakshya Sen reaffirmed his status as one of India's rising talent as he gave legendary Lin Dan a scare before losing in three games at the Auckland Open Badminton Championship, in Auckland, on Thursday.
With five titles under his belt, Lakshya Sen was racing towards the top echelons of international badminton before his stunning run was halted by the coronavirus pandemic, which brought all sporting action to a halt across the world. With the world in lockdown to contain the deadly disease, Lakshya too is enduring the uncertain times within the confines of his apartment, near the Prakash Padukone Badminton Academy (PPBA) in Bengaluru.
'If we have one dedicated coach to train 50-100 coaches who can go back and coach their wards, that will be a very good move'
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Ace Indian shuttler Saina Nehwal is the first Indian woman to achieve the World No 1 ranking.
Bengaluru's celebs wish the newly-weds.
Defending champion Lakshya Sen pulled out of the SaarLorLux Open Super 100 tournament after his father-cum-coach D K Sen tested positive for COVID-19 in Saarbrucken.
With the coronavirus pandemic halting all sport activities, India's former chief badminton coach Vimal Kumar on Tuesday urged the government to allow the Olympic-bound athletes to continue their training after conducting the required tests. Following the respective directives of the Talengana and Karnataka governments, the Pullela Gopichand academy in Hyderbad and Prakash Padukone Academy in Bangalore have been shut down for two weeks.
PV Sindhu will open her campaign against South Korea's Sung Ji Hyun, while Saina Nehwal takes on Scotland's Kristy Gilmour in the first round.
It was heartbreak for P V Sindhu at the World Badminton Championships. The Indian shuttler had to settle for a second consecutive bronze medal after succumbing to Carolina Marin of Spain in the semi-finals, in Copenhagen, on Saturday.
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