A forgotten hero basks in the hard-earned glory

Sports is cruel. It involves spending days and nights working harder, training like obsessed zombies with one dream of winning that coveted title that one might have dreamt since childhood.

Often in a country where parents are always worried about securing their children’s life and a career in studies seems to be the first option, to say it takes courage to tread a path in sport is an understatement. But still few souls walk that path, carrying the dreams of their parents and baggage of future on their shoulders.

The journey starts with a win here and there in some sub-junior and junior India ranking tournaments. But most voyage ends even before reaching the senior level. Those who make it to the next level too find themselves lost in the crowd of aspirants, all dreaming the same dream, waiting to write that illustrious chapter in their life that will not get lost in the pages of history.

So right from the first moment at the academy starts the battle to be the best. To first become good enough to wear the national colour and compete with the best in the world. What comes next is long hours at training and then playing the international challengers and the fight to move up the ranking ladder, which initially seems like a lift but with time, becomes a snake-and-ladder game, you go up and down every now and then. A win is not enough, no matter how hard you played. You have to weave a series of wins, you have to be consistent. From international challengers, you graduate to Grand Prix and Grand Prix Gold and then one day you reach the Super Series tournaments. Needless to say only a few reaches that upper echelons of players.

When you reach that privileged group, you turn another page in your life. But then comes the main cruel face of sports when one day who tweak a muscle, tear a ligament, twist an ankle or wrongly turn your knee and your world comes crashing down. Suddenly you find yourself sitting at a corner, watching your peers and juniors surpassing ahead. You sit at the corner of your room starting at an uncertain future.

Each day you tell yourself to stay upbeat, each moment you push yourself harder to feel a bit better, sometimes you would shadow practice in front of mirror, you would speak to you coach and family and they would tell you all the right words, trying to inspire you and motivate, even as inside you will worry about the dwindling ranking. Sometimes you would look at a match and tell your pals how you had beaten him on that tournament.   

Seconds will feel like days, minutes like months and hours like years and when you recover and return to the court, it will seem like an age has passed. There would be that iota of doubt in your mind in that first hit of the shuttle in your racquet when you face that opponent in your first tournament. Every loss will remind you of the time lost to injury and every win a balm on the scars that don't seem to heal. 

Many wait for that balm to heal the scars, passing through days, breezing through tournaments after tournaments waiting for that one stroke of luck that will bring you back to your rightful place. But sometimes that wait becomes eternal and slowly and slowly the resolve gives in and one fine day, you decide enough is enough and you quit. But there is another breed who hope a little longer, pray a little more and most importantly persevere harder.

Ajay jayaram is one such player who has lived those uncertain nights. For seven months he was left on the sidelines, nursing his shoulder injury, making multiple visits to the doctor, going under the knife and then going through the unforgiving rehabilitation process which involves rigorous physiotherapy.

For a player who had come into touching distance of qualifying for the 2012 London Olympics, only to lose the berth at the last moment after P Kashyap toppled him in ranking following a walkover in India open, Jayaram has shown what perseverance can earn you.

Not giving up is the antidote of failure and Jayaram's reaching the finals of the Korea super series proves that if one is determined nothing can stop you. Tomorrow this forgotten hero will take court against world No 1. Chen Long. No matter what the final holds for this Bangalore-based player, he has already inspired many like chief coach Pullela Gopichand once did when he won the All England championship in 2001 after recovering from knee injury. 

Yes, Sports is cruel but this cruelty makes your stronger, sometimes even giving birth to legends. As for Jayaram, greatness is still a far walk but then this has given him a moment to savour and no one can take away that moment from him ever. This is his time to bask in that glory and become an unforgettable part of history.

Heartbroken once again, Saina why did you lose?

Arthur Robert Ashe, a three-time Grand Slam winner, once said: "You are never really playing an opponent. You are playing yourself, your own highest standards, and when you reach your limits, that is real joy.”

Surely, Indian badminton star Saina Nehwal could not achieve that real joy today because she knows she never could really reach her limits or touch the high standards that she set for herself in the last two year.

"Failing to prepare is preparing to fail.” But for Saina, who has been training specifically for the World Championship for the last one and a half months, preparation was never a factor.

Infact, she was in the best shape to clinch the title this year considering the fact that she invested so much time to practice and achieve perfection in her strokes but then why did she falter once again at the quarters of the World Champion is a question that none but she can answer better.

Plagued by a lingering ligament injury for more than half of the year, Saina had done well to recover completely and get rid off that scrap bandage which she wore this year in most of the tournaments and regain her full fitness before the tournament.

There were concerns with her foot movement in the court but even for that arrangements were made as she was under the guidance of Tom Jones beside her mentor Pullela Gopichand but all these preparations meant nothing in the end as she succumbed to a straight-game defeat against world number three Xin Wang.

No loopholes in preparation, no dearth of motivation and there is no paucity of talent either, then why Saina, who is revered by one and all in the country couldn't achieve her dreams which she had seen many times since her kindergarden days. Was it this very pressure of a billion hearts that wants her to win every time she takes the court or it is the lack of believe?

For a shuttler, who has entertained the nation and the world in the last two years, beaten the chinese umpteen times and is considered one of the best in the world by not only her country men but also coaches and players across the world, it has to be a sad day. As a fan of the sport and as a fan of her game, I am disappointed.

Saina: Go play, play till the end of time

A nation mourns the loss of Saina Nehwal in the quarterfinals of the World Championship. A nation which followed the 20-year-old’s graph as she scaled different heights in her career, bringing laurels to a country starved off any recognition in Olympic sports such as badminton.

It was a dream that was shattered. A dream that was weaved over the years of watching the little star making giant strides in the field of badminton, making history and creating moments that India never believed ever existed before. And now that all these dreams have come crushing after her defeat in the World Championship, millions have suffered heartbreaks but even all these zillions of heartbreaks can’t ever equal the pain and disappointment that she must have gone through after the defeat.

At an age when teens walk in the corridors of college, either digging deep in their books or trying to live life in the fast lanes, here is Saina, carrying a billion hopes in her young shoulders, striving hard to make her country proud in a field where she found her calling. It takes guts to shut oneself from the world and all amenities and live a life of a monk, with discipline and dedication. And here she is walking the line without complaining because this is what she chose for herself.

It can be maddening to stand in all the glittery, to be the focus of the world, to be the cynosure of a billion eyes because at the end of the day as Paulo Coelho puts it “A winner stands alone”. Add to that the ubiquitous media, which want to know everything about you, the moment you return from winning a crown and then shuts you out once you lose. The amount of pressure that rests on Saina, I am sure none of the former champions such as Prakash Padukone or her mentor Pullela Gopichand had to face in their career.

So let’s not mourn her defeat but rejoice the moments that she has given to this country, moments which filled our heart with pride to say that we are Indians. Let’s wish her and pray for her and give her the confidence that we are there irrespective of the results because we believe in you. So go and play, play till the end of time.