Sports and Coach

whenever I see a young child having some prodigious talent in Sport, I start dreaming to see him or her  donning the national cap or Jercy. But unfortunately, I am yet to see anyone close by reaching to that level....why it happens so often. Recently, I saw a boy with a strong ball control abilities and he was dribbling the football awesomely. I thought he could become a fantastic midfielder and as usual advised him to take the game seriously. After a few days, When I saw him again, it was the not the foot ball but the cricket bat in the hand. This is the irony of our country that eventually everyone gets glamorized by this sport which in first place doesn't even deserve to be called sport. Anyway, I was surprised to find him belting the ball with stupendous ease. Seems, hand eye coordination was in his genes.  Being a free speaking mentor cum coach on every topic ,Once again, I went up to him and typically gave some tips ...keep your elbow straight, play close to the body, don't play the balls which you can't reach..etc..etc...I thought this guy has potential to reach at least state level if not national level. But to my surprise ( should nt call it surprise rather routine) , after a few days when I again saw him playing , he had become even worse player and my dream of seeing him at state level got shattered. ....I always wondered , what happens to the promising talent and what is required to take them where they actually belongs to.....till a couple of weeks back ,on one of the lovely Sunday, I went to watch the movie " Bhag Milkha Bhag" with the family. There has been already a large number of reviews written on the technicality of the movie but to me, this had a lot of answers to my question. Milkha was a prodigy from beginning, he was capable of outsmarting his fellow friends from village with his natural running abilities , had to go through many difficult phases in life before landing up with a job in army. The legend would not have been created if during a training session, Milkha were not spotted by his trainer Gurdev Singh  who discovered the athlete in him. And with him was made the success story of the legendary Milkha Singh aka the Flying Sikh. His skills were latter honed by the national coach after he failed in the Melbourne. But there were two prime factors apart from his natural talent. First was his own motivation of becoming a famous athlete ( the scenes of running for milk and egg, pride of the Indian blazer, asking coach to write the world record on the paper napkin were some of the most beautifully   depicted incidences ) and second was getting the right coaches and hence the right environment to groom the abilities. Ability and motivation can take to a level but a right technical training gives the edge to become a champion.  They not only develop but does many roles including assessor, instructor, mentor, friend, chauffeur, facilitator, adviser, demonstrator, fact finder, supporter, planner, organizer and motivator. 

Last week, we saw another world class player coming up in Badminton. Suddenly, in last few years we  are witnessing a large number of champions evolving in badminton. We were never sort of talent, then why all on a sudden this sea change. The only reason is the devout called P. Gopichand. Any accolades will be too little for this gentleman who himself was a extraordinary player. 

There are some more like him , Gagan Narang for e.g is doing an excellent job at his training academy. Some old style gurus in akharah like satpal singh. 

There are no dearth of talent in this country, what they lack is right motivation, direction and facility. Individuals like Gopichand can do a lot but to have lasting impact and to make this structured we need more number of financially strong corporates to come up and give these champion makers to function properly. We could end up with many Saina and sandhus in all sports. And not all talents will get lost in absence of right direction.