Badminton ace Prakash Padukone is here with the Indian badminton contingent to fine-tune the games of two top medal contenders for the 2024 Paris Olympic Games — two-time medallist and former world women’s singles champion P V Sindhu, and 22-year-old rising star Lakshya Sen.
Speaking about Sindhu, who has trained with him over the last nine months, Prakash said he can confidently say that the Hyderabad-born star shuttler Sindhu is a serious contender to clinch yet another medal after her silver and bronze-winning shows in the 2016 and 2020 Olympics, respectively.
“Overall, I’m happy with the way she has progressed. Of course, nobody can guarantee a medal, but I can confidently say that she’ll definitely be one of the contenders,” said Prakash ahead of Sindhu’s campaign here.
Sindhu has been placed in Group M with Kristin Kuuba of Estonia and Fathimath Nabaaha Abdul Razaq of Maldives.
There are 14 groups of three players each and the winner of each group will advance to the round of 16.
Prakash, who had never experienced the Olympic atmosphere before coming here after having been part of India’s campaigns in the Asian Games and Commonwealth Games in his playing career, clearly stated that he was here to focus “more on her strategy and tactics. She has a full-time coach Argus from Indonesia. He’s helping her with, you know, more of preparing the strokes and all that. So, he’s the travelling coach and he makes the programme.
“And my expertise would be more on, you know, when to use those strokes and, as you know, which has always been my strength — to use the right strokes at the right time, so that I have always emphasised on that.
“So, he’s making her create the strokes and my focus is to use those strokes at the right time so that you get a point and maybe, you know, introduce a little more of deception in her game, which is again part of, you know, using the right stroke at the right time.
“She’s always had the right strokes. So, using deception and trying to score points, I think, that’s what I have been focusing on. And you can probably see some of it in the Olympics. I wish I had a little more time, because it’s not easy to, you know, do it in six months.
“And out of those six or nine months, you know, she’s been playing tournaments as well. I mean, except for these last six weeks where, you know, we had a lot of time. Otherwise, she’s been in and out,” Prakash explained his role.
“I travelled with her for one or two tournaments. I think overall I’m happy with the way she has progressed. Of course, nobody can guarantee a medal, but I can confidently say that she’ll definitely be one of the contenders.”
Prakash also hinted that India could clinch not one but three medals in badminton.
“I would say in badminton, we have a good chance in three of the events — men’s singles, women’s singles, and men’s doubles. Of course, we have the women’s doubles also.
Speaking about his village stay experience, Prakash noted his sightings of tennis stars Rafael Nadal, 14-time men’s singles champion in the French Open here, and rising fellow-Spaniard and three-time Grand Slam men’s singles winner Carlos Alcaraz.
“It’s a great feeling. Of course, I’ve been to many Asian Games and Commonwealth Games, but I think the Olympics has its own charm. I think on the very first day we got to meet or I at least saw Alcaraz and Nadal. Looking forward to seeing many more stars from other sports as well.”