Interview with badminton doubles specialist Ashwini Ponnappa - "We've made a lot of progress in the last 10 years"

Intially, the first few months after the two of you got back together, results didn’t exactly go your way. And there was a lot of reaction from the public about how they thought that the pairing wasn’t going to get back to its former glory. But towards the end of the year, things gradually started falling in place. You guys won the Nationals and finished runners-up at the Tata Open. This year you lost some close matches in Switzerland and the All England and won the bronze at the Asian Championships. Do you think you’re getting closer to that peak level once again?

It was very difficult once we renewed our partnership as there were a lot of issues that we were dealing with at the time. And personally for Jwala, it has been very difficult; she’s had to jump over many hurdles and overcome many obstacles in that period. And she has managed to overcome all that and has gotten down to playing and performing. So I must really thank her for that.

As for reaching our peak, I can say that we are getting better with every passing tournament, and like I said the exposure and match practice is something that is helping us. We are taking it one match at a time and our looking to be consistent in our showings.

I was a little disappointed with the semi-final at the ABC, I felt that we could have played a better match. But, we drew a lot of positives from that bronze medal and we’re looking to build on it further in the coming months.

Gold medalists Jwala Gutta (L) and Ashwini Ponnappa celebrate winning the women’s doubles badminton final of the XIX Commonwealth Games at the Siri Fort Sports Complex in New Delhi on October 14, 2010.

You are the defending champions in the women’s doubles at the Commonwealth Games having won at home last time around. Do you think there’s added pressure now as defending champions or do you think there was greater pressure playing last time around in front of a home crowd?

The home crowd actually served as fantastic support for us as we won the gold. There was some pressure to deliver in front of your home fans, but it helped us in the end.

Right now, we’re not really looking at ourselves from that defending champions angle. It’s all about going into the Games with a clean slate and looking to tackle each opponent as they come. The knowledge, though, that we’ve won this once before will definitely serve as a psychological reassurance though.

Back-to-back golds there would just be fantastic, wouldn’t it?

Oh absolutely! 2010 was a very proud moment for me. I was very happy winning the gold back then, here in India. And yes, it was a great achievement, but I really want to win it again! To do it twice would just be something special.

Of course, no athlete’s journey is ever complete without the contribution of their coach. Tell us a little bit about your association with Tom John.

Working with Tom sir has been brilliant. There has been a lot of improvement in my game since the time we started working together. Especially my net game, which has improved a lot….and I mean, a lot. Earlier I wasn’t so confident whenever I was at the net, I used to feel more comfortable playing at the back. I used to get very nervous whenever I ventured forward.

That has now changed and the credit goes to Tom sir. We worked on my movement on court and that has also helped improve my net game. He puts you through the paces and expects that you give everything.

So he’s quite the hard task master…?

(Chuckles) Very hard actually. But, it’s with your best interests in mind. One thing about him, he’s a great motivator and ultimately he wants to help you raise your game and improve, so all the hard work that you put in with him definitely leads to results.

Earlier this year, you decided to try your hand at the all-India ranking tournament in Bangalore. Was it something that you always wanted to do or was it more of a trying-your-hand-at-it sort of thing?

I’ve actually always wanted to play singles. I stopped playing singles when I was young due to circumstances. But yes, Jwala wasn’t taking part in the tournament, and the event was happening in Bangalore, so I just decided to give it a shot.

I enjoyed it thoroughly. It was nice because everything on the court depends on you, there is no one else around who you can blame for your shortcomings. One thing in singles that I learnt is that you always need to keep your feet moving, you never really are stationary for too long. And I actually believe that experience will help me out in my doubles as better court coverage will only aid my doubles teams that much more.

Talking about more singles matches in future, it would be very tough, because you have to remain focussed on it and that is something that is tough to do, to juggle singles and doubles. Like I said, in badminton, the doubles players are specialists and so are the singles players. So it’s nothing serious as of now.

President Pranab Mukherjee honouring Ashwini Ponnappa with the Arjuna Award in New Delhi 29 August, 2012 .

With the growth in popularity of the sport in the last decade or so, fuelled by the badminton contingent’s successes on the international stage, how has the support of the government and the association been? And has there been the necessary step-up to sustain this success?

The support’s been good in terms of the financial support that the government offers us with respect to our international trips and all of that. The association too has been a strong pillar of support for us through our journey so far, and it has gotten better and better.

I’ve also seen that this increase in popularity has led to more kids taking up badminton and more active participation beyond just playing it as a hobby. So that’s one very encouraging sign.

We’ve made a lot of progress in the last 10 years and hopefully we can continue down that path. On the doubles front, though, there’s a lot more that we can do. And hopefully, we can try and emulate the successes we’ve had in the singles arena.

Finally Ashwini, 10 years of badminton, multiple national doubles titles, Commonwealth Games gold Medal, World Championship bronze, ABC bronze later, what are you looking at in the future? Do you make short-term plans or do you have specific events on your mind?

I generally tend to take things one step at a time, have short-term targets. But the Rio Olympics in 2016 is definitely something that I’m looking at right now. I would love to qualify for Rio and do really well there. It would be a great feeling to make the cut and represent India.

At the London Olympics in 2012, we didn’t exactly have the best of times, and we were a little disappointed with the way the campaign ended. So, very keen to make up for that at the next one in Rio, which promises to be a carnival, and one of the biggest Games in recent times. So, looking forward to that with much anticipation.

(Ashwini Ponnappa is currently in New Delhi as part of the Indian women’s team taking part in the Uber Cup that got underway yesterday. India are placed in Group C along with Thailand, Canada and Hong Kong. They beat Canada 5-0 in their first encounter yesterday)