Make space for another star, Saina Nehwal. P V Sindhu has arrived. While most girls her age would have just left their Barbies behind, Sindhu has excelled herself as a senior with her maiden Grand Prix badminton title in Malaysia last Saturday.
In an open letter, BWF secretary general Thomas Lund said the decision to go ahead with the All England Championships was made based on the best advice at that time. "It has been very disappointing to see some members of the badminton community speculate on the sincerity and motives of the BWF in this time of crisis," Lund wrote.
Olympic silver medallist PV Sindhu will learn from her mistakes and perform better in future, her father P V Ramana said on Saturday. "(Sindhu's opponent) Carolina Marin has played an excellent game and she truly deserves the championship. "However we assure you under the guidance of her coach (P Gopichand) in the coming years, Sindhu will definitely perform well and keep the hopes of the all the Indians high," Ramana told reporters with a hint of disappointment after the watching the match at the Pullela Gopichand Badminton Academy in Hyderabad.
The Hyderabad Open badminton tournament, scheduled to be held from August 11 to 16, was on Thursday cancelled by the world body BWF in view of the coronavirus pandemic. The event was part of the BWF's revised calendar to restart the sport after the pandemic-forced cancellations since March.
Former national badminton coach Vimal Kumar lauded Saina Nehwal for not letting her relationship with fellow shuttler Parupalli Kashyap affect her game.
Silver medallist at Olympics and World Championship, Indian shuttler P V Sindhu has turned film producer to pay tribute to her coach Pullela Gopichand through a digital film on Teachers' Day on Tuesday.
India's only individual Olympic gold medallist Abhinav Bindra was named on a panel entrusted with the task of preparing the blueprint for the country's success at the next three Games, the sports ministry said on Monday.
The Badminton World Federastion (BWF) unveiled a revised international calendar to salvage the remainder of the season, disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Pullela Gopichand called P V Sindhu and Saina Nehwal -- his two most successful pupils -- as 'precious diamonds'.
National coach Pullela Gopichand refused to comment on the controversy over Prajakta Sawant who had accused him of "mental harassment" in her petition to the Bombay High Court which has allowed the shuttler to attend the ongoing training camp at his badminton academy in Hyderabad.
Sports in India has started moving in the right direction and the impact of the six medals the country won at the London Olympics will be huge, said national badminton coach Pullela Gopichand in Mumbai on Thursday.
On the last day of the competition, Yash Vardhan and Shreya Agrawal bagged three gold medals each.
Former All England badminton champion Prakash Psdukone tells Rediff.com's Bikash Mohapatra that the focus ahead of the next Olympics should be on winning gold, and not just medals and there should be more support to athletes at the grasroots level.
In the wake of India's biggest ever medal haul of six in its Olympic Games history at London, chief national badminton coach Pullela Gopichand on Thursday exuded confidence that the number would be bettered four years later in Rio de Janeiro.
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.
Ace Indian shuttler Saina Nehwal returned to a rousing reception on Tuesday after winning a historic bronze medal at the Olympic Games in London.
Both states try to outsmart each other in felicitating the shuttler.
London Olympics bronze medallist Saina Nehwal says the Glasgow World Championship made her realise that she needs to work harder on her stamina and beat tougher players to regain her place among badminton's top-10.
Gopichand also wondered to why the legendary Padukone, India's first badminton superstar 'never had anything positive to say about him'.
Describing Saina Nehwal as a 'phenomenal', her coach Pullela Gopichand today said if Saina had not won the Olympic medal, his life would have been incomplete.
Saina Nehwal's bronze medal win at the Olympics is the happiest moment of her career. For her coach Pullela Gopichand, however, it means the world.
Winning an elusive Olympic gold in Tokyo next year is PV Sindhu's top priority but reigning world champion's immediate target is to do well in the coming tournaments as this is the qualifying year for the quadrennial extravaganza.
The Indian Olympic Association and the federations might be against it but the National Sports Bill has got a collective thumbs up from India's top athletes, who feel the draft has the potential to drastically change the country's sports scene.
Saina Nehwal is sweating it out a bit more in training ahead of the Yonex Sunrise India Open because the ace Indian shuttler says she sometimes forgets her strokes.
Milkha Singh, 92, best known as the 'Flying Sikh' and most remembered for finishing fourth in the 400m final in the 1960 Rome Olympic Games, was bestowed with the lifetime achievement award.
National badminton coach, Pullela Gopichand, on Wednesday expressed happiness at the performance this year of Indian shuttlers and termed Kidambi Srikanth's feat of winning four Super Series titles as 'phenomenal'.
Dipa Karmakar says the roads in Agartala are too narrow for a BMW and also the city does not have a single BMW showroom or service centre.
National coach Pullela Gopichand, on Saturday, said that the loss of form of ace shuttler Saina Nehwal, whose campaign in the Japan Open Super Series ended in semi-finals, was not a cause of concern.
England's pull out of the World Badminton Championships has not affected the tournament, India's chief national coach Pullela Gopichand said on Monday.
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.
Chief badminton coach Pullela Gopichand, who guided Saina Nehwal and P V Sindhu to Olympic medals in the successive Games, says he was lucky that he wasn't good in studies and it was a flunked IIT (Indian Institute of Technology) exam that paved his way to be a successful sportsperson.
The SAI has formulated a detailed draft of the Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) to be followed before reopening of its training centres by the end of this month, as suggested by Sports Minister Kiren Rijiju but subject to clearance from the Health and Home ministry.
Jwala Gutta said that before comparing ourselves to badminton giants like China and Japan, India should look to improve the quality of doubles' players. Jwala also questioned the logic of holding the national camp only at the Gopichand academy.
India's chief badminton coach Pullela Gopichand says the draw hardly matters if the shuttlers are focused on gunning for a medal at the Olympics. He believes that it will boil down to two good back-to-back matches under pressure to earn a medal at the Rio Games, starting August 5.
The debate on scheduling kicked off after the legendary Prakash Padukone recently observed that the Indian players were "definitely playing more tournaments than required".
The quarter-final ouster in World Championship is a thing of past for ace shuttler Saina Nehwal whose only target is now to clinch a medal for the country in next month's Commonwealth Games to be held in Delhi.
National badminton coach Pullela Gopichand remained tightlipped about his split with Saina Nehwal, saying he doesn't want to talk about the issue as the Asian Games is just round the corner.
Former all-England badminton champion Pullela Gopichand has been honoured with all major sports awards - the Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna, Arjuna and Dronacharya. His experience taught him a lot and today, he coaches badminton champ Saina Nehwal. Gopichand tells Urmila Rao of Careers 360, how his career took shape.
Sai Praneeth and H S Prannoy will represent India in the Youth Olympic Games in Singapore and the young shuttlers said they would settle for nothing less than a gold in the inaugural edition of mega-event starting on August 13.
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