PV Sindhu moves out of Gopichand Academy, set to train at the Gachibowli Stadium

Olympics silver medallist PV Sindhu has moved out of Pullela Gopichand Academy and will now be training at the Gachibowli Stadium in Hyderabad under the scrutiny of Korean coach Park Tae Sang. Sindhu who has not been on a great run off late will be looking to focus on her psychological aspects to get the better of her opponents in the near future.

It is shocking that the World No. 6 and India’s one of the biggest medal hopefuls, PV Sindhu has not yet qualified for the Tokyo Olympics. However, the star shuttler is close to achieving that feat and therefore she is looking to train harder to be in her best shape during the Summer Games later this year.

There were a few rumours that Sindhu had some issues with her coach Gopichand and hence she decided to move out of his academy. But Sindhu’s father, PV Ramana cleared the air by clarifying that it is only because of psychological reasons and nothing else. He shared how the Gachibowli stadium provides that feeling of playing at a world-class venue which Sindhu would not have got had she trained at the Academy.

“She hasn’t split with Gopichand, but wants to train in an ambience that gives her a feel as if she is training in an Olympic arena. The change of venue is with the approval of the Sports Authority of India (SAI) and in coordination with the Badminton Association of India (BAI),” Ramana, an Arjuna Award winner, told IANS.

Sindhu will be trained by Korean coach Park Tae Sang, he took up the job after another Korean Kim Ji Hyun decided to quit in September 2019.

Ramana revealed how training at the Stadium will benefit Sindhu for her upcoming major tournaments. But he was not very vocal about the sparring partners for the former Olympic Silver medallist. He [Sang] will take a call on that issue,” he said.

There were talks of Sindhu splitting with Gopichand earlier as well coupled with her disappointing outings at the Thailand Open in January where she could not progress beyond the quarterfinals followed by a poor  World Tour Finals. Therefore are questions over Sindhu’s fitness, to which his father said, “Her fitness is okay. She is training in the pool. She is also going to the gym twice a week.”

However, a coach from the academy reminisced about her regime ahead of the 2016 Rio Olympics. “She could do 400m repetitions in 60-62 seconds once a week. She did deadlifts and half squats with more than 100kg during the gym workouts. Now, as she isn’t training at Gopichand Academy, we don’t know much about her fitness regimen,” he said.