 Salaam from the NewsClick Studios in New Delhi, I am Sihant Ani and with me on the show, this is Play Things of Alien Forces. With me on the show as always is our sports editor Leslie Xavier Leslie. Year end special, ending the year on a high actually for Indian sport because some good news from the world badminton championships that happened over this weekend. Yeah, not bad. Srikanth reaching the final, winning the silver and again for the men's it's an unprecedented feat. We have so far only one bronze medals and a great way to end the season as well because Indian badminton if you look at it from an overall perspective it was a good year. The Olympic medal for Sindhu as expected probably the color should have been better but again it's a tight game over there and she did well to be on the podium again back to back Olympics. And towards the end we had seven players in the world tour finals qualified for the world tour finals. Again a big achievement when you look at qualifying itself because we are talking about the top eight players in the world. And top players or doubles pairs and out of which again Sindhu and youngster Lakshya Sen he reached the semi-finals and he missed out on a medal and Sindhu reached the final and silver. So good year after the world championship happened a busy year for them also because the end of the end of the year back to back global level tournaments as such. But again a slightly I mean I have a different view on that and which we were also discussing earlier before. Yeah I was going to say we have this WhatsApp group that is Leslie myself and our eternal skeptic Mr. Webber Bravanandan. And these guys had a quite interesting take on what happens post an Olympic cycle. Yeah so if you look at Srikanth's career trajectory it's an interesting journey because he is considered a world level player. He is considered I mean when he reaches top 10 he was world number one previously into the end of 2018. And when we look at Srikanth generally when we mentioned him we think of him as a top 10 player period quality wise. But just that Srikanth's run in the top ranks sort of happens he misses the bus when it comes to Olympics. It happens after the Olympics usually in 2018 like I mentioned when he became world number one that's right in the middle of two Olympics. And now look at it the Olympics got over and he is just showing signs that he can become the world number one again. But three years away from Olympics so this is something that I have discussed about Sindhu as well long back. This discussion this thing in my mind it has been playing in my mind for a while now that the idea of which tournament or which competition to peak. This is very important in modern sport because it's simply very difficult to sustain yourself at high intensity through the season. Day in day out and then also when the stakes are high bring that game out. Classic example of I mean since we are talking about badminton I would yeah there are examples in tennis and all this sport. But in badminton classic example was Linda and I mean the Olympics all world championship this man comes and wins everything and goes away. And then he fades he is not there but is there too because he is planning his next trajectory. So this is something that Srikanth or Indian players seem to have missed or the management for that matter because you have to plan this very systematically. Sindhu does that beautifully. Sindhu we always address and describe Sindhu as a big tournament player. What is a big tournament player. It is that planning that is required to step by step increment and ensure that you are there on the boil in perfect zone when the big tournament is happening. And then ease off a little. Now after the Olympics Sindhu East off Sindhu's first two tournaments two tournaments two tournaments she never reached the semifinals. She was building it world tours she did better. And if you look at rest of the players also they are on and off now after the Olympics the Olympic medalists for instance. And yesterday Srikanth's finalist opponent was world number 22 Singaporean player. And on a given day considering that Srikanth was ranked higher he should have beaten him. But for some reason after taking an initial lead in the match he just faded as well. So it was a game of in that sense elite level lesser models and out of which one of the players had to lose and it happened to be Srikanth. But I would say missed a great opportunity to add a world title into his resume. But I would also hope that there is some more system in place for planning these players journey. Especially someone like Lakshya Sen even bronze in the world championship which is again considering his age he is just 19. So it's a big achievement. Yeah again his peak form has started after the Olympics he never qualified. And so I'm just hoping that from here because next year is a big tournament year also for India with Asian Games, Commonwealth Games. And of course badminton the tour continues on parallelly. A planning and system is in place so that he doesn't burn out or get injured or whatever which is something that happened to Srikanth. He got injured playing the Nationals in 2019. Why should a world number one player Nationals unless if there is some plan to it. So I think one of the things and again I guess this is important because this is after all play things. Is that the challenge for these players particularly on tour is to participate perhaps in as many events as possible so as to maximize the amount of prize money that they can potentially earn. Especially with like sort of bigger money tournaments like the year enders and all of that. That's one thing and then also in terms of the maybe the frequency of tournaments they play because of sponsor commitments and other things like that. They I think need to be a little bit more on the court versus players let's say like the Chinese gang that probably gets a lot more state support. Because here and I may be wrong on this but I don't think so. But even under the top scheme which is the central government scheme for elite level athletes who are supposed to have a chance of winning in Olympic medal. Even there they are better off the more they play. The more time they are spending on tour the more sort of you know support they are getting from the state to go and compete and play and then some allowances and such. So perhaps these are some of the polls that come into play when it comes to deciding and Sindhu because you mentioned Sindhu and how good she is at planning. It's also because a large chunk of Sindhu's earnings now because she has made herself into a market friendly marketable figure. A lot of her income comes from endorsements. So she doesn't necessarily have to bank on prize money or even state sponsorship in order to sort of make ends meet as it was or have a decent you know living on a decent living wage. It's again it's one more factors there to add to what you said. So it's not just about the price money here. It's also about ranking. The more you play you get ranked you get a better draw. You won't end up playing the world number one at in the first round. So it's that that matters too. So and then also they mandate from BWF World Federation that you should have so many numbers of tournaments under your belt that that. So there have been discussions in badminton about player burnout and all that and so the key year is intensity and physical form and game form. And it it it can be varied. It can be planned by simple science which is which is very prevalent now in sports and fitness management and all that which is periodization. So you start the year off in a systematic manner but you are not in your peak and you decide where you want that peak and you periodize your training your competition your exposure. So yeah you play you reach the semifinals of various tour events but then when the moment comes you are winning and this is key for other sport as well. So something that we discussed during the Olympics. Shooters context. Shooters context also in general those who make it to the Olympic Games at the last possible moment or athletes or swimmers. So Sajan Prakash for instance he made it with I mean he was the first Indian swimmer to qualify with the A mark and he post the Olympics after he returned in interviews he spoke about how he can't possibly within a month. Yeah. In the sense he qualified a month before that was his peak and he said to repeat again for the Olympics and probably break the record make the finals. So whatever he needed at least six weeks of training. The period is that and he didn't have that. So this is something that we have discussed even before Sajan came out and said about this that Indians speak for qualifying. So then forget the medal part of it at least at least for the larger chunk. Of course we won six medals and seven seven medals and it's it's great. Yeah. Okay. I'm going to forget that. But the larger the other question is why we compete at the Olympics. What is at stake. How. I mean all these things are pretty had ad hoc still. So that's that's that's something that in the coming years sports since since since other things have been set. Money is coming in. The PR is there and role models are there also in in various sport in athletics. I mean imagine that gold medalist in athletics. So now it's it's time to get the country to take off from where I mean use this as a launch pad and and that requires planning and and for the elite elites different type of planning for the grass loose different types of planning and let's see what the coming years turned out next year. Like we always say it's an important year Asian Games and Commonwealth Games. We have many medalists in the Asian Games who never made it to the Olympics. So in that sense the performance at these continental events and in a larger sense how much should we take it with a pinch of salt. That is also also something that we need to and more than we as as journalists skeptical or not. It's also sports administrators you should you should take note of such things. Which leads us nicely into our next topic of conversation on this show which otherwise we're doing a year end. So there's a good chance that we're going to sit and talk for two or three hours. So you know in the interest of keeping things kind of on track and on time. Firstly if someone can tell me how how much time we've already done on the show. But secondly the Olympics. I think a good way to kind of break this show up is also to club all of those Olympic sports into one. And since you're the man that's been covering most of that. An unexpected and brilliant gold medal performance from Neeraj Chopra. But beyond that what did you make of the games. Firstly we get back to Neeraj in a bit. I mean it was so on a personal personal note I would say I was skeptical about the games being staged at when pandemic is around. And such a mega event with all those all those players and officials and delegates coming in and Tokyo having a fee period with cases. And I've written pieces on that at that point and then somehow after the Olympics the piece I wrote was that I'm missing it. I just don't know what to do now. The thrill has gone away. The thrill has gone away. So that's games for you and it's always inspiring. What are we the outcome? What are we the number of medals that our country won or where the records were broken? Where they want to resist? Where the doping was there? All these things hardly matter because the games represent something larger as four sports lovers. And it's not by chance or fluke that even non-sport lovers hook on to the Olympics when it happens. That is its power. And that is what I guess I mean beyond the money and other factors that these guys were at vested interest in to stage the games. Beyond that I think that that is the power that that is the larger goal that everyone stands for. We can obviously say a lot about how that has been used to do a lot of other things, vested interest, whatever. But games was there and as far as India is concerned we underachieved in a way because our shooters misfire. And that again goes back to the conversation that we are planning part of it. Planning as well as protecting the athletes. I feel that there was a lot of muck being drawn around especially the young shooters who were supposed to win medals like Manu Bhaka for instance and her tussle with the coach. And then officials coming in saying statements, other people saying stuff, Manu's family saying stuff. And all these things I mean on the eve of the Olympic Games and then right through at the venue it's not done. And also Manu's first event she performed, she had bad luck and she performed badly. And after that what did you do with that athlete? You need to get her to refocus because you have two more events left in the runner. And she is again right up there for winning a medal and instead of that controversy sources this that and they just ruined it. That is just one case of it. So for me medals apart when I look at India's performance at the Olympic Games this highlights what is the problem for India. The lack of understanding of the people who run sport in the country as to what they are dealing with. It's not a political game they are dealing with. Most of them have a political background that's probably why this is happening. So sports persons competing in the field it's not a political game at all, it's not an election rally at all. You have larger things at stake, people involved in it with mind, body and matter everything is in tandem as to being in place working together. And in all that mess I mean if athletes come out and win medals of course it is a special achievement. That's where when I look at Bajrang Punea's bronze medal for instance. So there is this talk within wrestling fraternity that Bajrang is arrogant, Vinesh Fogut is arrogant because they demand that they want this, they want that. And demand at times going against the Federation officials going vocal to the media. So Bajrang has had his coach Shaco Bentonitis for a long while and a senior Federation official before the Olympics told me that the Federation is waiting for him to fail. Then the acts will come coach whatever and then we control you, you shut up and do stuff. So when Bajrang had that injury one and a half months before the Olympic Games it was actually a solid period for him for everybody involved. And the way he fought and won that medal and if not for that medal he would have been completely made a sideline, made an escape body, may not be sideline because he will come back again. So same with Vinesh Fogut after that they hounded her till she came out in the media and presented her case and presented the side that she has been mentally tortured with this and then the officials had to step back. This is on the simple subject of a physio. Of a physio and wrestling as a sport and you need a high demand. Highly demanding sport. Yeah, you have limited number of, I do understand limited number of officials were allowed because of the pandemic situation there. So physios maybe India at 5, 6, whatever they had to be distributed among this thing. But a woman, I mean we address women wrestlers in the mix and she was just asking the women wrestling team needs a physio. Sindhu had a personal trainer and physio at the cost of other coaches but that stopped our, I agree. But again the wrestler in question here is also trying to use whatever the cloud that she has to get what the basic requirement to compete at a high level. So it's a given and for me arrogance matter for sports person because that translates on to the playing field. And you just can't rein it in and then expect them to be super aggressive and fighting for that medal when that fight is being squeezed out of them by the system. So that is a major problem in Indian sport. When you look at it, the way they completely control and completely dominate. Exactly, so at least need to have that mindset right through and that's it. And of course if they are outrightly very wrong and all that there is. Sure, that's why the system is in place. So moving back to Neeraj Chopra then of course we've talked enough about this actual Olympic. In fact our roundup was completely Neeraj only after all. And then we promised everybody we'll talk about everyone else. But we didn't. But what next for Neeraj, I think that's the important part because like you're talking about planning is important. It's a big year and he has the chance to genuinely make a mark as being one of the best in his discipline ever perhaps. Let me say this thing. It's like last episode I believe or last to last episode when we said about boycott Olympics. It's a baggage. So Neeraj has a small baggage. He won that gold with awareness better misfiring. So I would say the next goal for him because he has achieved a lot in his career. Of course the world championship gold medal. And also it would be to win that global any global tournament for that matter major global tournament with beating better on the field on a given day on equal terms. Which is a sizable ask. And so he should be planning for that because otherwise the next Olympic games we would see Neeraj competing and competing for the medals. But he should be competing for the gold as defending champion. So I'm sure inside his mind and he's a pretty sorted focused character. So inside his mind that's what he wants and he is working towards it. Just that after the Olympic games I felt that we as Indians failed him because we were celebrating him so much that he just lost. Imagine he was running from one felicitation to another during covid times and he got fever. He was that stretched. And then forget all that and one month later everything is settling in. But he's not been left alone to train to compete at IWF Grand Prix event or whatever when the rest of the world had started competing. So and competing why because again peak was Olympics but these guys are competing because they are that's how they taper off and taper in to the next year. And next cycle it's for as far as India or Asian countries are considered Asian game cycle is there and that is an important tournament for probably Neeraj can just walk in and win that tournament. But he has to walk in and throw and win the tournament too. He has to throw above 85 to win. So that's and we have a very strong Pakistani Javelin Tlaver with right breathing down his neck. They are great friends but it's great to see that rivalry too. And if two Asian Tlavers are competing for the Olympic and for a medal at the Olympic games nothing like that. I was hoping that he would be Pakistan. He would be there at the fag end of the Olympic finals but he faded out. So Neeraj would be he's very clear that he wants to win all the medals that he has won in the sense key in the common games again in the Asian games again and plan that year like that. And beyond that but the biggest challenge happens in Paris where he would have to face Wetter and Wetter would be keen to show that who is the boss. Interesting time for him. And also interesting time for athletics Indian Javelin also because the thought was that this would explode into something big for the sport, big specifically for Javelin also. Centres are being planned and all that. Does it work like that? That's the question because we have Javelin Tlavers whom Neeraj is helping too. When you interview Neeraj I had an old friend say that I called him once long back after his junior world title that I went to interview. You talk to him and he's also good for you. He made him sit. So he's like that kind of a person. So Javelin Tlavers are there in the system already but they are here. So Neeraj is still an aberration. So how do you overcome that aberration? That would be the biggest challenge for Indian sport. Basically take it from that 80 mark to the 90 mark. 88 if you can touch you are there in the world. I mean Wetter. But consistently 87-88 plus means that you can win a medal. So that's the target. But we are not getting there our other elite Javelin Tlavers. And that is something that it's not Neeraj's problem. It's the system's problem. But it should be an exciting year for Indian Athletics given these events that you are talking about. Particularly the Asian Games where you get to see a lot of the women athletes also. The younger athletes of the next generation were not perhaps at Olympic level yet but hoping to build up to that. And I think last time we had a really good outing at the Asian Games. Athletics wise. So looking forward to more of the same there. Finally I think because Leslie almost forgot about it. We have to devote five minutes to talking about hockey because for Mr. Raghunandan it's been a big year I think. And he has of course been covering the Olympics and hockey in general. Leslie spoke with him earlier because he's moved back. He's left us and gone back home unfortunately. But Leslie spoke to him on the phone earlier and this is what these guys chatted about. Hi Vibh, thanks for joining in here. So yeah, let's getting straight to the point only. Hockey, your game and good year. I mean Olympic medal. And also the women just missing out on the medal. So we can't, when we look at Indian hockey and this performance we can't look at it in isolation that way also. Because already when they reached the medals reckoning, they were talking about researchers of Indian hockey and saying that the future is bright now that we are back to where we belong. So realistically speaking and assessing what has happened on the field and also around Indian hockey in general as far as building of the future teams and the current structure and such a business. Do you think be sure we can assign a larger meaning to that as far as progress of hockey is concerned? Well as you're speaking right now there's like several tournaments happening in India right now, hockey tournament. And I would say that when it comes to the hockey ecosystem itself, I guess players, coaches, they get enough opportunity to play. They got a lot of opportunity to play through the year despite the fact that there is, I mean last year of course it was a raging pandemic so they had to cancel all national tournaments. But unlike several other sports which have, which have still not held their nationals and which have held their nationals and like made it seem like they've done sports persons a favor by holding them. Hockey is still holding, like they've had the women inter-departmental national which is a new tournament they brought about just to give more girls the chance to play and force more departments to get, give jobs and create sports quota teams for women. They're holding the men's inter-departmental right now, the men's senior national right now, the women's senior national have happened. There is a lot of hockey happening and it's always like, so we've had in the last few years this has constantly been the case. But the question we have to ask is like how many people are actually watching this, how many people are paying attention to this and I mean we constantly demand that these things be shown on TV, on YouTube and they're obviously not going to because it's really tough to show these things and how many people are interested in it. I wanted to also ask about the women's game and later I'll get, yeah, later I'll get into the men's game again once more but what about the women then? Because great performance again but again a period of change now that the head coach who I was right to with them moulding this team is off now, save on Marine and a new person has come in and again it's a cussed team because you have to blend in youngsters and all that so how do you think these things are happening and especially considering the fact that the structure for women's game is much more bad than what it is for the men's game in the country as far as grassroots and... So actually Yenak Shopman is not going to be like new to the team because she was already a part of the team that went to Tokyo she was, in fact she is the iconic image of how she was there in that picture and all the players speak really warmly of her, they all speak about how she is really invested in speaking and trying to help them grow mentally stronger and speak to them and has like an emotional connection with a huge number of them and Shod had a completely different style, even Yenak is Dutch but I guess for whatever reasons their coaching styles are completely different and so it's not going to be a completely new phase I guess this sort of succession plan is quite useful is very helpful for them to have had and besides that when it comes to youngsters, there were a few youngsters in the team and yeah I mean they're going to be more slowly coming up, they unfortunately had to postpone or I don't know yeah they had to postpone for the Junior World Cup which is going to be held in South Africa which would have been actually a really good measure to see where our women's team is again the success of the women's team has as much to do with the great and determination and skill of our players and the tactics that Shod implied as it has to do with the fact that there were several teams that did not have that sort of preparatory time, just did not have that amount of game time and that's why we did really well now how it translates into the bigger picture is like something that we're going to have to wait and see there are a lot more tournaments happening there is a little bit more effort from Hockey India side it's always been they've always tried to like have a little bit of equality but I can't I mean I really can't say like I was speaking to Pritam Sivach and she's a grassroots coach she runs an academy and three of her players, three players that she literally groomed from when they were kids were in the women's team and she was still saying that she doesn't have like an ashrat or she doesn't have a residential facility she basically she's petitioned the state government and the central government for funds for many years they promised her a lot of funds after the medal, sorry not after the medal, my apologies after the semi, when they qualified for the semi-finals and when they went into the bronze medal match just before that there were a lot of promises made which haven't been fulfilled and one really strong point that she made was that instead of like we should like groom these sort of grassroots centres and this is more pertinent for past for girls in our country than it is for boys simply because we are still a really patriarchal regressive society where we don't want women to play sport and if you want them to play sport we want them to play like you know so which is even the only way to break this according to Sivach is like she has a facility where she runs grassroots sport everyone trusts her in that facility she is producing players she obviously has the skill set that coaches and scouts require but because it's not a high performance facility and because we are setting up these high performance facilities in like 3-4 corners of this country they don't want to go so far there are concerns I mean it's still a developing state and when it comes to women's hockey I think we only started paying attention let's be very honest we only started paying attention on like August 8th, 7th or 6th this year of course that's the time where the entire country was interested in that and like you mentioned the promises happened before the bronze match and when the medal didn't come I guess it's forgotten the chase for medal is bought I mean of course in sport when you look at it when you look at chasing the price that's a big deal because that's motivation that is focus that is that is the path that we need to traverse but at the same time it is proving to be a curse for Indian sport that way and getting back to the men's team because you interestingly said that junior World Cup would have been a right measure for the young girls the same thing applies to the men and they played at the World Cup here in Bhubaneswar and they said I mean it was an overwhelming performance that when you consider that they went in as defending champions and favorites so what do you reckon is this a sign of something wrong in that sense because you're looking at Olympic bronze medalist senior team and then we were expecting the junior team to would step into some of the roles that these great players of ours I mean in the senior setup are doing and then they underperform I mean again like I think this is like a bit of a you can have like there's one strong view that all of us can share which is that junior systems are really important and it's really important to groom players at a young age and but this is like there's two views now we can go down which is one is that our earlier junior team which contributed a lot of players to this bronze medal winning team they were like put through a rigorous it was like a single-minded determination by the federation by the coaches by everyone involved in hockey in this country to ensure that that team win the junior World Cup they played in the Australian Hockey League they went and played there that team went and played there they did like so many tours before the World Cup like they had so much game time as just a unit and in that team by the way there were like four players who had turned out for India whereas in this junior team that played a month back there was only one player that was the captain Vivek Sagar Prasad so it's like a two-way street where you there was a single-minded determination to produce this team that is going to go and win the World Cup and then go ahead and like do glorious things for this country the captain of that World Cup winning team by the way has disappeared everyone should know that it was a very good movie I can't even say very good but there was a movie that came out and after that he's completely disappeared and there were others who've done really well and others who've cemented their place in the team for the future but I would say that to ensure that this cycle continues rather than chasing success we should follow the models that say teams like Australia and Belgium yeah I mean I always put Australia away before Belgium simply because Australia been doing this for 25 years right Belgium has been doing this recently but yeah sure so the idea is not to win these things at the junior level but ensure that you create enough quality that can just quickly be pumped up the conveyor of that and that is really the objective of I would say that's the objective they're driving towards winning a junior World Cup is I mean it's really not such a big deal if you think about it in football Nigeria won the under 17 World Cup the most number of times yeah has become close to winning the senior World Cup ever you know so it's really something worth considering on that note because we are at this for time as well so thanks for sharing your inputs here it's as usual very in-depth and well studied so yeah thanks for that thanks for having me thank you man alright so that brings us to a close of this year end special episode of play things of alien forces from Leslie, myself and the entire news click team thanks for watching have a great end to the year and hopefully 2022 will be better for all of us we'll be back early early in the new year just taking a break for a couple of weeks to sort out some back-end and other issues but we'll be back early next year for more play things and for more on all of these stories of course we'll be doing stories throughout visit our website newsclick.in and follow us on all the social media platforms thank you for watching happy new year goodbye