Over 20 states confirm for National badminton

NEW DELHI, January 14: Country's top shuttlers, including P. Gopi Chand, Aparna Popat, Manjusha Kanwar, PVV Lakshmi and others will be vy...

NEW DELHI, January 14: Country’s top shuttlers, including P. Gopi Chand, Aparna Popat, Manjusha Kanwar, PVV Lakshmi and others will be vying for top honours, representing their states, in the Senior National Badminton Championship, beginning here at the Indira Gandhi Indoor Stadium from February 3.

Over 20 states units affiliated to the Badminton Association of India (BAI) have confirmed participation in the February 3-10 tournament. More units are expected to send in their entries before the closing date of Januaryh 25.

The Nationals, coming as it does before the Manipur National Games, gains in importance as the performance of the individuals here will be taken into account for selection of the state teams for the Imphal Games. Hence, all players, including those fringe cases, are bound to put up a good show in order to gain entrance into the state team. On the inaugural day, there will be qualifying rounds in all sections and the semi-finalists in the qualifiers will make it to the main round where they will be joined by the seeded players.

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The semi-finals are slated for February 9 while the final will be on February 10. Both the semi-finals and the finals will be covered live by Doordarshan.

The Delhi juniors and the seniors will find it tough this time around to compete against the likes of Karnataka, Punjab, Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra, who have been doing well over the past couple of years. Delhi women, particularly, have been excelling themselves and among juniors, the Delhi boys have been giving a good account of themselves.

According to S.P. Singh, Delhi Badminton Association secretary, his team has been preparing well for the Nationals and was hopeful of winning a couple of titles. He, however, admitted that the task will be difficult in the senior sections. He was of the opinion that Punjab and Chandigarh have also shown tremendous improvement in the junior sections over the years and can prove quite handful to other competitors.

Similarly, the country’s top pairs in men and women’s sections, including the likes of Vincent Lobo, Markose Birsto, Jaseel P. Ismail, Rajiv Bagga, PVV Lakshmi, PVV Sharda, Madhumita Bisht and Archana Deodhar will try and dominate the Nationals.

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The Delhi Badminton Association has roped in quite a few sponsors, thanks to the local efforts as well that of the Badminton Assocaition of India. The only hitch that remained was about the rental for the IG Stadium courts.

But even that seems to have been amicably settled and the Sports Authority of India (SAI) is said to be considering of giving concession to DBA on the rentals as it did to the organisers of hockey tournaments at the National Stadium recently.