It seems like just the other day that Saina Nehwal reached the final of the All England Championships. Her opponent, Spain's Carolina Marin, was the reigning World Champion but she was just starting to make her way up in the badminton. The Indian, a veteran at the age of 25, had won her three career meetings against the Spaniard and this was expected to be no different.
But on that day, something went amiss. After dominating, the first game and starting the second game well, Saina succumbed to nerves and lost 21-16, 14-21, 7-21.
"Shouting out instructions to a player is usually not something I do," her coach Vimal Kumar had said after the match. "I was telling her to be more composed. But I think her brain had just switched off. She wasn't reacting to anything at all."
It was completely unlike Saina, who built her reputation as a player who never gives up. But it was also perhaps a sign that losing against 'the top players all the time' had finally got to her.
Over the past year, Saina was forced to take the hard decisions; decisions that she could come to regret but she pushed on regardless with a sense of maturity that is increasingly showing in her game as well.
In June last year, her ranking slipped to ninth and for a while, it looked like P.V. Sindhu -- a player who P Gopichand, her coach, was increasingly starting to focus on -- would overtake her. To many, Saina -- plagued by injuries and bad form -- was a spent force.
"I have taken some many hard decisions to get here. I kept losing to the top players all the time, in fact after last year's World Championship I even thought of quitting badminton. It was a very dark time in my career. People were saying 'Saina your career is finished'," Saina said after beating former world champion Ratchanok Intanon of Thailand 21-16 21-14 in the final of the Yonex Indian Super Series tournament played at the Siri Fort Sports Complex in Delhi on Sunday.
In September 2014, Saina decided to part ways with her mentor Gopichand to train under Vimal Kumar at the Prakash Padukone Academy. It was described by some as an act of betrayal. But it truly was Saina desperately seeking a path back to the top.
“I realized I was getting stuck somewhere. I just wasn't being able to beat the world's top 3 players. Now if something is not working for me, I shouldn't hang on to it, right?” she had said.
She needed to find a way to willingly break down the game that brought her so much success and then to build it up again to a point where she would be successful again. As any player who has faced a mid-career crisis will testify, this is, to put it mildly, tiring and scary. There is the physical aspect of it and then there is the mental strain of expectations. Not so much what the others have -- but the expectations you have for yourself.
In an individual sport like badminton, it's all you. You are there in the middle alone, with the spotlight on you. You get no help from the outside. The coach may shout out instructions from time to time but you are alone in the moment and that is when you have to decide -- do you attack, do you defend, do you go down the line or cross, do you try a half-smash or a drop shot?
In his autobiography, Open, Andre Agassi talks about the loneliness of the athlete.
"In tennis you stand face-to-face with the enemy, trade blows with him, but never touch him or talk to him, or anyone else. The rules forbid a tennis player from even talking to his coach while on the court. People sometimes mention the track-and-field runner as a comparably lonely figure, but I have to laugh. At least the runner can feel and smell his opponents. They're inches away. In tennis you're on an island. Of all the games men and women play, tennis is the closest to solitary confinement....”
He may not know it but what Agassi said holds true for badminton as well. The rules are very similar and even though the matches are not as long -- it is quicker and the decisions are tougher.
And in her struggle, away from the court, Saina felt alone as well. But that is exactly where her support system and Vimal Kumar stepped up.
Vimal assured her that she was still good. But he worked tiny changes into her games -- the variables that made her difficult to read once again. Though, to begin with -- they obsessively worked on fitness. Saina's game depended on her fitness but Vimal felt she had become so slow that opponent could freely manipulate her.
Saina also added the straight flick down the line, cross-drops and a tumble at the net. Little changes but enough to plant doubt in the minds of her opponents. Enough to make them crawl back to the drawing board in search of an antidote. Enough to allow her to climb back to the top.
A bronze at the Asian Games, a Super Series title in China, a trip to the All England final followed. And then finally came the Indian Open title. Her reaction to winning the title on Sunday was typically understated but it still showed just how relieved she was. The rut she believes is now over.
"I think a big burden off my head. Last four years, I was struggling, losing in pre-quarters or quarters, this is the first time I have reached the finals and won it. So, too many surprises for me in this tournament, being the world no 1, winning the title. I am very proud of myself. I never thought this day will come after so much struggle, this is the best phase of my life," Saina said.
The best phase of my life... words not lightly spoken. For the time being, though, she can lean back, put up her feet and savour it all -- she is Saina Nehwal. World No.1. Legend.
-firstpost
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