CHENNAI: The Athletics Federation of India (AFI) on Friday has named a 59-member team for the Asian Athletics Championships in Gumi, South Korea, a day after the National Federation Senior Athletics Competition got over in Kochi. In the absence of the Olympic and world championships medallist Neeraj Chopra, Commonwealth Games medallist Avinash Sable, long distance runners Gulveer Singh and Parul Chaudhary, quartermilers Vithya Ramraj and Rupal Chaudhary, hurdler Jyothi Yarraji, triple jump national record holder Praveen Chithravel and Abdulla Aboobacker will lead India's challenge.
Focus will also be on the 4x400m teams, especially the women’s that had been unsteady for a while after injuries and a slew of doping cases. At the last edition of the Asian athletics meet, India had finished with 27 medals that included six gold.
AFI selection committee chairperson Adille Sumariwalla said that the focus is on the World Athletics Championships. He said that the Asian athletics will be a stepping stone towards the mega event of the year.
“This is a stepping stone only,” he told this daily. “Now it is time for us to focus on the world championships. An athlete cannot peak multiple times like at the Asian Championships and again later at the worlds. It is an ongoing process. We had put up the qualifying standards (Asian meet) well in advance (December 31, last year). We are strictly following those qualifying standards.”
The AFI would take some solace in some good performances in the lead up to the Asian meet. There were quite a few meet and national records during the four-day competition that concluded on Thursday. However, Sumariwalla has a different take on this. “There will always be good and not so good performances. We should learn from whatever has happened on the ground. If it is good we should analyse why it is good or whether it is (peaking) too early or too late. If it is bad we should find out why it is not good and what is required to be good to perform well at the world championships.”
The former AFI president and current spokesperson also said that the relay teams, especially the 4x400m women’s, will be decided closer to the World Championships. The AFI president Bahadur Singh Sagoo said that the AFI was not sending a 4x400m women’s team for the World Athletics Relays. The AFI has named a six-member women’s 4x400 relay team for the Asian meet but according to the selection committee chief, the six names are not automatic choices for the world championships.
Sumariwalla said that the World Athletics meet is still about five months away and they would finalise the names days before the event. “We have selected athletes for the camp (in Thiruvananthapuram) based on their performances and we keep adding and deleting names based on their performances,” he said. “We keep inviting people and it’s their prerogative if they want to join or not. But we are clear that they have to be part of the camp to run in relays. It is a team event and if they don’t want to train together then we don’t want them. We are not the USA that has the sprint power. But still they lose 4x100m relays because of lack of coordination. So we have to train together. There is a bonding. Important thing is that the team should be staying together.”
This is also to avoid issues like we had with Nirmala Sheoran, Sumariwalla said. “If she had run in the relay we could have lost medals at the Asian Games in Jakarta,” he said. Nirmala was banned for four year after the Athletics Integrity Unit tested her in 2018 and nullified all the results between 2016 and 2018. India lost a medal won at the 2017 Asian athletics meet. She lost her Asian titles and India had lost a relay medal as well.
“The reason we have told them to participate in two events is to ensure that there are no issues later on. There have been instances when athletes used to get cleaned up before the final trials. They would be hiding and not run the whole year and then come and compete in the final trials and by the time they reach the event timings change. We have seen this time and again. We are trying our best to avoid those things."
He said even though he would not like to predict he expected the athletes to perform better than last time. “Each one of them should perform their best,” he said.
India's squad:
Men: Animesh Kujur (200m), Anu Kumar and Krishan Kumar (800m), Yoonus Shah (1500m), Avinash Sable (3000m steeplechase), Gulveer Singh and Abhishek Pal (5000m), Gulveer Singh and Sawan Barwal (10,000m), Praveen Chithravel and Abdulla Aboobacker (triple jump), Sarvesh Kushare (high jump), Sachin Yadav and Yasvir Singh (javelin throw), Samardeep Singh (shot put), Tejaswin Shankar (decathlon), Servin Sebastian and Amit (20km race walk).
4x100m relay: Pranav Pramod Gurav, Animesh Kujur, Manikanta Hoblidar, Amlan Borgohain, Tamilarasu S, Ragul Kumar G, Gurvindervir Singh.
4x400m relay: Vishal TK, Jay Kumar, Manu TS, Rince Joseph, Tushar Manna, Santhosh Kumar, Dharamveer Choudhary, Mohit Kumar.
Women: Nithya Gandhe (200m), Rupal Chaudhary and Vithya Ramraj (400m), Twinkle Chaudhary and Pooja (800m), Lili Das and Pooja (1500m), Parul Chaudhary and Ankita (3000m steeplechase), Sanjivani Jadav and Parul Chaudhary (5000m), Sanjivani Jadhav and Seema (10,000m), Jyothi Yarraji (100m hurdles), R Vithya Ramraj and Anu R (400m), Shaili Singh and Ancy Sojan (long jump), Pooja (high jump), Seema (discus throw), Annu Rani (javelin throw), Agsara Nandini (heptathlon).
4x100m relay: Nithya Gandhe, Abinaya Rajarajan, Sneha SS, Srabani Nanda, Daneshwari AT, V Sudheeksha.
4x400m relay: Rupal Chaudhary, Sneha K, Subha Venkatesan, Jisna Mathew, Kunja Rajitha, Sarndramol Sabu.
