Beijing: India's top ranked shuttler Anup Sridhar on Thursday vowed to give his best saying, "It is a great honour to represent the country in the Olympics".
"If I play at my best, I am reasonably confident that I will do well," Sridhar said after a training session in Beijing.
He, however, admitted that he doesn't have any special strategy for this competition. "Though I am happy with the draw but I can not underestimate my opponents as every player is going to be playing at high intensity at the Olympics regardless of ranking or previous record."
Asked about his ankle injury, Sridhar said, "I had a little bit of hiccup with the twisted ankle. I am working really hard to get fit and as I showed on court today, I am almost fit, I just need to get a slight problem with the Achilles (tendon) sorted out, but I think I can get there."
Sridhar plays against Portugal's Marco Vasconcelos in the first round of the badminton competition on August 9. The Indian has not played against Marco but given the form and ranking he should be able to make it to the next round.
However, after that the tall Bangalorean is likely to face the world No. 16 Shoji Sato of Japan, against whom he has a 3-2 win-loss record.
And If the Indian manages to surprise Sato, he is likely encounter Peter Gade of Denmark in the quarterfinals. The Dane is ranked eighth in the world and is seeded eight at the Beijing Games.
"At the moment I am just thinking of my first match, I'll just be taking it one game at a time. I am aiming to treat it like any other major tournament. I really want to play at my very best and am going to concentrate on doing that. With that as my approach, I want to just take it one match at a time and aim for good results at each stage," the Indian said.
About playing in his first Olympic, Sridhar said, "I have played in the Commonwealth and Asian Games and the atmosphere was fantastic. So I am guessing this can only get better."
To a query about his new English coach Tom John, he said, "The last four months have been hard for me with a couple of injuries here and there. I have been trying to stay fit through all of it and he (Tom) has done a good job of keeping me physically fit. I feel really strong and quite good."
He hoped that he gets a match against a Chinese player, "I really hope I get a match where I am playing against the Chinese, that would really be something special. To play against the Chinese and the crowd would really be fun."
The 29th ranked Sridhar, who has career-victories over Athens Olympic gold medallist Taufik Hidayat and former All-England champion Hafiz Hashim, said playing in Olympics was like a dream come true and added, "I hope I will have a successful stint here."
National coach Pullela Gopichand was optimistic of his two players Anup Sridhar and Saina Nahiwal doing well here.
"They are very young. It is the first Olympics for both of them. I think the pressure will be the key issue and it depends how they react to it. But they have done some good preparation and had decent results. Both Anup and Saina know how it feels to be playing the big names in the game. And in the 21-point format, I have seen pressure do crazy things to the favourites. Our players have everything to gain and nothing to lose," he added.
Asked how the Indians will be able to handle the vocal Chinese crowd, Gopichand said, "I am sure with our guys playing in Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, China and those countries for a long time, they are used to playing in front of crowds that are supportive of the home team, so we are not bothered about it."
Comments
0 comment