Danish badminton coach Thomas Engholm, who is currently conducting a special training camp at the Prakash Padukone Badminton Academy (PPBA), urged young Indian shuttlers to play with passion and allow their personalities to shine through. “It’s something that can be the deciding factor in a career,“ Engholm told TOI on Tuesday . “We always discuss talent but a player with passion and the right personality will have what it takes to script a longer career. Today’s shuttlers must learn to handle obstacles, success and defeat in the proper way ,“ he said.
“Seeing players smile after a tough practice session is something coaches should strive for,” said the 38-year-old, who has been working with kids in the U-19 category for the past two weeks along with academy coaches Yusuf Jauhari and Vimal Kumar here.
“In my style of coaching, the focus is always on specific exercises, strokes and movement in short sessions, so I wanted to get a feel of how things are done here. I wanted to study the ways in which Indian coaches worked on endurance, movement and repetitions,” the former junior player, who admits he is a self-taught trainer, said.
The Dane from Aarhus, who is a language and biology teacher when not on the court back home, said he had been training kids to understand why certain strokes were important in different stages of a match.
“Unlike China, Indian badminton is still open to different techniques and philosophies. There is the Chinese method with strict disciplined routines as well as the European method of working on skill and playing with enjoyment. That’s why it was so easy for me to work with the kids at the PPBA,” he said.
Published in the Times of India
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