Is India ready to make telling impact on the Olympic stage?

It is the pinnacle of sport. Inarguably, it is the dream of every athlete to stand on the podium at an Olympic Games and make the country proud. The Olympic Games challenges competitors to use their adrenalin rush to their advantage and spectators to ride piggyback on scores of emotional roller-coasters that athletes tend to take them on.

With a year left for the Games to begin in Tokyo, there is excitement in the air. After all, India has invested a lot in its elite athletes, even bending backwards in some instances to keep them happy. The support for training and competitive exposure – in tournaments, big and small – has been so forthcoming that the sports NGOs may have had to reconsider their roles in bridging the gap.

There are experienced campaigners like MC Mary Kom and PV Sindhu who are expected to be in the forefront of India’s campaign. Many youngsters like shooters Saurabh Chaudhary and Manu Bhaker and Javelin thrower Neeraj Chopra, not to speak of wrestling ace Bajrang Punia, seasoned badminton player Kidambi Srikanth or weightlifter Mirabai Chanu, can figure prominently as well.

It is will only fair to say that it would be a disappointment if India does not improve on its best medal-haul in the Olympic Games – six in London – when it competes in Tokyo next year. We heard the Indian Olympic Association President Dr. Narinder Dhruv Batra declare that he expects a double-figure medal haul in the Olympic Games.

Here is the list of 14 Indian medallists predicted by GraceNote.Com a year ahead of the Olympic Games in Tokyo:

Of course, this list will see changes over the next 12 months. And, as those who have dealt with the pressure-cooker atmosphere in the Olympic Games will tell us, the competition is a different ball-game altogether. Besides, it will be important for these athletes to take this prediction in their stride and continue to train to translate their potential to medal-winning effort.

There can be no question that the modern Indian athlete has developed a hunger to finish on the Olympic Games podium. There can also be no doubt that this generation of athletes have learnt to be fearless in the quest. It can therefore be expected that those who are named in the list (and others who are not) will put their best forward, taking their fitness and form in the Tokyo Games.

Yet, it is hard not to recall an assessment made by the Mission Olympic Cell of the Sports Authority of India in 2016. A projection of 12 to 19 medals was made barely six weeks before the Games were due to start in Rio de Janeiro. Of course, the then Director-General Injeti Srinivas had warned that this was as assessment of potential rather than prediction.

The assessment expected the sport of Shooting to fetch between two and four medals, wrestling was portrayed as guaranteeing three medals. Athletics, Archery, Badminton, Boxing and Tennis were shown as worth one or two medals each. Gymnastics and men’s Hockey were other prospective medallists.

The two-medal showing, thanks to PV Sindhu and Sakshi Malik led to much angst among the fans and Government alike, even though everyone understood that medals were not easy to come by. It also resulted in many a post-mortem, not the least by the SAI Director-General himself who cited near-misses, difficult draws for boxers, lack of fitness and below-par performances as reasons.

Despite an awareness that there are plenty of medals at stake in disciplines like Judo, Karate, Taekwondo and Swimming, India has made little concerted effort towards being relevant in these sport at the global level. Not even a start has been made in this direction, despite the erstwhile SAI Director-General’s suggestion that India retrain its focus on such disciplines.

India’s thinktank – essentially the Mission Olympic Cell, the National Sports Federations – must ensure that any course-correction is attempted sooner than later. This will be true of Athletics and Badminton especially in which India has pinned faith. It would be easy to brush such predictions off, but it will do no harm if the red flags are acted upon.

On a more long-term basis, India can pause to reflect on the reasons for GraceNote.com’s predictions to not include Athletics, Badminton and Hockey among India’s likely medallists in Tokyo. Instead of waiting for the Olympic Games to be complete, India can draw lessons from the projections and ensure it will be in better space for 2024 Games in Paris.

At some point of time, the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports will have to revisit its decision to back every proposal for training and competition that comes from National Sports Federations. If it does not lead to medals in the Olympic Games and World Championships, it may not be wrong to consider the return on investment and revise plans for the future.

However, for the moment, it will be exciting to track the evolution of India’s elite athletes on whom much has been invested and on whom more is riding. Some of the images flitting in the mind’s eye may come across as being in the realms of fantasy, but then what is sport if it does let the fan indulge in a flight of fancy.

There is always a strange excitement when one makes a prediction in the unpredictable world of sport. There is guaranteed pleasure, irrespective of the outcome. Indeed, there is much joy when an athlete justifies the decision to stick one’s neck out in making a prediction. Curiously, there is just as much joy when athletes prove one’s assessment wrong and come out on top.

The list of athletes is courtesy: http://www.gracenote.com/virtual-medal-table/