Sparring with men toughened P V Sindhu ahead of Tokyo Games

HYDERABAD: Just two days before leaving for the Tokyo Olympics, P V Sindhu beat three young men who are up-and-coming players on the national badminton circuit. That was the first time she had beaten all three after losing practice games to them for an entire year. The wins gave her the belief that she would come back with a medal from Tokyo.
Jagadeesh Kalaga (20), Aditya Bapineedu (21) and Abhyansh Singh (20) were Sindhu’s sparring partners and they toughened her for the bigger battle. “She told me, now that I have defeated them I am confident of winning gold at Tokyo. It is always advantageous to play against boys,” said Pradeep Raju, chief coach and founder of Suchitra Badminton Academy where the three men train.
All three belong to different states and have different styles, forcing Sindhu to adopt different strategies during practice games.
Jagadeesh, who hails from Visakhapatnam, plays just like South Korean shuttler An Se Young, while Abhyansh plays a fast-paced game like Tai Tzu-Ying, according to Sindhu’s team.
Abhyansh, who hails from Varanasi, focussed on the front court, a style similar to Tai’s game at the net. “I would take a lot of points from Sindhu akka at the net. I beat her for an entire year. But just before she left for the Olympics she beat me convincingly. That was when we knew she would win an Olympic medal,” said Abhyansh.
Those who watched Sindhu’s game at Tokyo were impressed with how she tackled Akane Yamaguchi and He Bing Jiao at the net. That was not Sindhu’s strength before the Tokyo Olympics and coach Park Tae-Sang concentrated on this area with the help of the sparring partners.
Jagadeesh is very good at round the head attack. “All three of us are happy about what we have done for her preparation,” Jagadeesh told TOI.
Aditya, who won all his matches to help his team win the Khelo India University games in 2019, has a very strong forehand attack. “I am an attacking player. When I played her, I used to attack from the forehand corner. She worked very hard for the Games. We were expecting nothing less than gold. She is an inspiration for generations to come. For a medal-starved country, winning two Olympic medals is no mean feat,” said Aditya, who is from Khammam in Telangana.