The ace Indian shuttler opens up in an exclusive interview.
Saina Nehwal had to settle for a bronze medal at the BWF World Championships, a relegation from her silver in the previous edition in Jakarta two years ago.
Saina may have retained the silver, or even won the gold, had she got a little more time to recover after a draining three-game quarterfinal victory against Scotland’s Kirsty Gilmour.
Such has been the scheduling by the Badminton World Federation (BWF) that the 12th-seeded Indian got less than 17 hours between her quarterfinal and the semifinal match against Japanese seventh-seeded Nozomi Okuhara.
On the other hand, Saina’s compatriot and fourth-seeded PV Sindhu had 32 hours between her quarterfinal against Sun Yu of China and the semifinal against Chen Yu Fei.
Saina’s quarterfinal against Gilmour ended just after 1am (IST) on Saturday. She was back on court for her semifinal at around 5.45pm (IST) the same day, which was about 16 hours and 45 minutes later.
Sindhu was done with her quarterfinal at around 5.45pm (IST) on Friday and did not take the court until past 2am (IST) on Sunday, which meant she had 32 hours between her matches.
The lack of adequate rest between matches left Saina drained halfway through the second game of her three-game loss to Okuhara.
“Time was less to recover and I played back-to-back tough matches with Ji Hyun Sung (Korea in pre-quarterfinals), then Kirsty Gilmour and then Okuhara,” Saina told DNA from Glasgow after her semifinal loss. “But scheduling was a little funny. Last night (Friday), I finished last and then next day, (I had to play) in the morning schedule.”
Asked if the scheduling could have been better, the 27-year-old former world No. 1 said: “Yes, some more time to do proper recovery for legs. It is BWF schedule. Players has nothing to do with this nor do they have any say in the scheduling. I don’t know how they do it.”
Saina’s coach, U Vimal Kumar, felt sad for Saina. While neither Saina nor Kumar blamed the scheduling for her exit, the coach felt that the fixtures were done to cater to the TV scheduling.
“Saina felt drained out from the middle of the second game. That is what she conveyed to me,” Kumar told this paper after painfully watching his ward go down fighting from the court sidelines.
“If she had got a little more rest, she could have recovered better for this (semifinal) match. Anyway, it is the same for Okuhara as well. She too played a tough game against Carolina (Marin) yesterday (Friday).”
The Japanese higher seed Okuhara also played her quarterfinal against defending champion Marin of Spain late on Friday in the court adjacent to Saina’s, winning in three games in an hour and 33 minutes.
Asked if any attempt was made by the Indian think-tank to reschedule the matches so that players who finished first the previous day, played first the next day, Kumar said: “We tried but TV scheduling was given priority. Anyway, it is the same for Okuhara as well. Saina finished late, especially her physio sessions and after that dinner. By the time she went to bed, it was 1 (local time) in the morning (5.30 am IST, Saturday). This could be the reason for her feeling totally drained out today (Saturday).”
The scheduling might have been severely harsh on Saina, but that was no excuse for her semifinal exit. In fact, it was a tremendous achievement from Saina to have come this far in the Worlds after going through a career-threatening knee surgery last year.
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