(MENAFN- Gulf Times) Close on the heels of India's remarkable successes at the Commonwealth Games, where the South Asian country's paddlers put up their best ever show, picking up eight medals, including three golds, one of the top-level Indian coaches has evinced interest to train Doha-based budding paddlers.
Olympian and former Commonwealth champion S Raman, who has come to Doha for a reception held in his honour by the country's Indian Chartered Accountants forum, has said Qatar has good infrastructure in place for the game and there are chances of producing quality players from the schools' level itself.
Yesterday, at the reception held at Birla Public School, the school authorities expressed their desire to set up a table tennis training facility at the school under Raman's guidance. 'Qualified coaches from our academy in Chennai can impart lessons to Doha-based children at regular intervals. Those keen to develop a career from table tennis could come to Chennai, said Raman.
His wife Bhuvaneswari B, herself a former Commonwealth and Indian national medallist, coaches girls at their academy.
Raman, a multiple national champion in table tennis in the 1990s and also a winner of the Arjuna Award in 1998, currently runs Raman TT High Performance Centre, which has produced the highest-ranked (46th) Indian player ever, Sathiyan Gnanasekaran.
While expressing happiness at India's performance at the Gold Coast Commonwealth Games earlier this month, the coach said that the impressive victories of Indian teams have gone down well with the country's sports ministry and it has now elevated table tennis as a priority sport.
'I was so happy when India's sports minister and ex-Olympic silver medallist Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore personally conveyed to me the decision soon after the triumphs of our players at Gold Coast, he said.
Raman's protege Gnanasekaran played a huge role in the Indian men's team's gold medal victory. It is the first time that both the Indian men's and women's teams won gold at the Games. The other gold for India was won by women's singles champion Manika Batra.
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