New Delhi: World Champion PV Sindhu is in London to prepare for next year’s Asia leg of the Badminton World Federation’s (BWF) calendar. Giving this information, PV Sindhu’s father PV Ramana said Tuesday that the shuttler decided to go to London as ‘her practice was not happening properly’ at the ongoing national camp in Hyderabad.
Olympic silver medallist Sindhu has been in London for the last 10 days. She posted a picture with sports nutritionist Rebecca Randell of the Gatorade Sports Science Institute (GSSI) on her social media page, Monday.
See link: https://twitter.com/Pvsindhu1/status/1317915280169947136
“She (Sindhu) has been in London for last 10 days. We can’t stay with her for two months, so she went alone,” Ramana said. He refuted reports that she left because of an unspecified dispute in the family.
Owing to the COVID-19 pandemic, the BWF has been forced to move the World Tour Finals (January 27-31) and the two Asia opens (January 12-17 and Jan 19-24) to Bangkok in January next year.
Ramana said that Sindhu was not happy with her training at the national camp. “Her practice was not happening properly here. After the 2018 Asian Games, Gopi (chief coach Pullela Gopichand) didn’t take interest in her training. He didn’t provide a proper practice partner to train with her. She was not having enough quality practice and was fed up with the treatment,” he claimed.
When contacted, Gopichand confirmed that Sindhu had informed him about her move to London. He however, refused to respond to Ramana’s remarks.
“She has gone to the Gatorade training academy. That is the information we have. They have a training institute there. I don’t know the exact details or duration of the programme,” Gopichand said. “I don’t want to respond to what her father has to say. If Sindhu says something, I will respond,” he added.
Sindhu has also said on her Twitter account that she doesn’t have any issue with Gopichand.
See link: https://twitter.com/Pvsindhu1/status/1318422767843352579
Ramana said Sindhu had informed the Badminton Association of India (BAI) regarding London trip. She had also kept Gopichand in the loop.
“She had sent a letter to BAI last week about her trip, with a copy to Gopi. Since she will be there for at least eight weeks, she will be practicing with England team. So, she requested BAI to put in a word to Badminton England,” Ramana stated.
Sindhu has been part of the national camp for Olympic hopefuls. She was training with her Korean coach Park Tae Sang ever since Kim Ji Hyun resigned last year. She skipped the recently-concluded Denmark Open Super 750 tournament. Sindhu will next be seen in action at the Asian leg of the adjusted BWF World Tour 2020 in January.
The Hyderabadi will not get a direct entry in the rescheduled World Tour Final. This is because BWF has decided against handing automatic invitations to current world champions in the season-ending tournament.