India pins its hopes on divers at Asian swimming championships
Entrusted with the responsibility of reviving the Asian swimming championships in Ahmedabad after a nine-year gap in October, the Swimming Federation of India (SFI) is not only looking at showcasing its organisational ability but also backing its divers to achieve worthwhile results in the continental event.
Competing alongside global swimming powers such as China, Japan and Korea at the newly-built 'world class venue,' India is pinning its hopes on its divers.
'There's reasonable expectation that we may have a medal in diving. We've sent our divers for a one-month training programme in Malaysia, where they can get a little bit of informal judging. Their scores can be realistically projected. An Australian coach (Shannon Roy) is working with them, particularly in the men's synchronised diving event, where we are targeting a medal. They were supposed to go to Australia for a competition, but couldn't get visas. We are looking at other competitions,' SFI secretary Monal Chokshi told The Hindu.
'We are having a water polo camp (for 25 men and 25 women) from January in Bangalore. We will be selecting the best 14 and four reserves. We are planning to send them to an eastern European country for training in the last one month of preparation.
'We will bring back one of the coaches (Babovic Miodrag and Anderic Nemanja) who were working with our teams for the Asian Games preparation, but the teams were not cleared. This Asian Championships is going to be also the Asian Games qualifier with the top-six qualifying. After 1986, we have never played at the Asian Games. So we hope to break the jinx.'
The SFI expects good performances from four swimmers. 'In terms of medals, we are very unsure. We have good prospects. Srihari (Nataraj), Benediction Rohit has performed exceptionally well. We have seen some great performances from Shoan Ganguly as well as Aryan Nehra. We'll be holding the India camp for two months at the same venue,' said Chokshi.
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