Indianasian test: Uphill Asian Games task in store for Indian contingent
CHENNAI: The plethora of Indian athletes who medalled at the 2018 Commonwealth Games had one common mantra while speaking to the press after their victory dance. “Our real test is at the Asian Games.” With 30 days to go before the caravan rolls into Jakarta, it’s easy to understand why most of India’s finest sang from the same hymn sheet moments after collecting their gongs. In the last five CWGs, beginning from the 1998 edition at Kuala Lumpur, the country have won 112 gold (and 309 overall). Those numbers dip sharply at the Asiad, 53 gold and 246 medals overall. In other words, for every gold India have got at Asiad since 1998, they have got more than two at the Commonwealth Games.
There are a few obvious factors for the numbers being skewed by such a large extent — as 2010 CWG hosts, India enjoyed home advantage, a factor that does come into play even at multi-discipline events. But, by and large, it falls because India’s expertise in disciplines like shooting and weightlifting is limited to CWG level. At the Asiad level, they are nowhere in the picture. Asia’s best in the two above-mentioned disciplines usually win medals at the Olympics. The stats bear this out. Seven of the eight Asian men who had medalled at Rio had won gongs four years ago at Incheon. It’s the same amongst the women. Two of the four were on the podium in both Incheon as well as Rio.
This sort of contrast isn’t limited to shooting. In fact, it’s starker in sports like table tennis, where India bagged an unprecedented eight medals. “You can’t really compare the two (Asiad and CWG), know?,” A Sharath Kamal tells Express. “Asiad is tougher than Worlds because in the latter there are chances of playing a few inferior nations. At Asiad, you will have to be at the top of your game to even have a chance.” The paddler is just tempering expectations ahead of what will be a keenly watched sport from an Indian perspective. Fifty-two out of 60 medals at the last five Olympics have been won by Asians.
Weightlifting is another sport where India’s athletes are kings at the Commonwealth level but paupers when it comes to competing with Asia’s elite. India has accumulated 58 medals in weightlifting at the CWG since the turn of the century but are yet to open their account in this discipline at the Asian Games in the same time period. Zero.
The flipside to this conversation is athletics, where India have had considerably more joy at the Asian Games than at the Commonwealth. The Athletics Federation of India (AFI) sent 26 Indians to the 2018 edition while the contingent to Jakarta is in excess of 50. “We are expecting 15 medals from our athletes,” AFI’s secretary CK Valson told this newspaper.
“Fifteen is more or less sure shot but it can go up to 19.” While it would represent one of the country’s richest hauls in the discipline ever, Valson’s expectation is based on how India’s best are there or thereabouts in more than a few events. For instance, Jinson Johnson is expected to medal in both the 800 and the 1500m. The same goes for the likes of PU Chitra, who has two of Asia’s six best times in the women’s 1500m category this year. If history is anything to go by, the same trend — fewer medals with athletics being the kingmaker — will continue in Jakarta.
swaroop@newindianexpress.com