CHENNAI: Finally, after much scrutiny, the sports ministry has released the names of support staff and additional athletes for the Asian Games in Nagoya, Japan. India’s contingent will now comprise 768 members including coaches and support staff. It is understood that the sports ministry, Sports Authority of India (SAI) and Target Olympic Podium Scheme (TOPS) officials have had a brain storming session before zeroing in on the final list.
The first list released by the ministry had 492 athletes and now that has swelled to 503 (269 male and 234 female) with 11 new entrants from surfing. The team officials including coaches and support staff stood at 246, and 19 Indian Olympic Association contingent staff. In the last edition at Hangzhou, India sent a record number of athletes 661 athletes (333 men and 328 women).
Cricket will have a jumbo support staff of 20 that include coaches VVS Laxman, Sunil Joshi, Hrishikesh Kanitkar and Amol Majumdar. The one-third support staff policy has been relaxed for cricket where 14 coaches, five medical staff and one team manager have been approved by the sports ministry.
Athletics will have the highest number of contingent at 110 with 43 female and 36 male athletes. Earlier, 73 names were released. This time the six names like 200m sprinter Harita Bhadra, triple jumper Asha Ilango, quarter-miler Kiran Pahal, hammer thrower Parveen Kumar were added. The ministry has approved 20 coaches, three physios, four masseurs and one medical officer, who would be among 31 support staff for track and field athletes. With Neeraj Chopra withdrawing due to injury, the name of Yash Vir Singh could be added soon.
In hockey, there are six coaches, three phyios and one masseur. Performance specialist Wayne Lombard, who has been working with the women's team, will accompany the team as head scientific advisor along with men's and women's coaches Craig Fulton and Sjoerd Marijne.
As reported by this newspaper, four surfing names have also been added to the list. Two men — Kishore Kumar and Sivaraj Babu. In women’s category, Kamali Moorthy and Sugar Shanthi Banares are the surfers for India at the Games. India will be competing in 36 disciplines at the 20th continental Games.
There has been intense lobbying from the National Sports Federations to include coaches but the sports ministry had been quite clear. They would want enough support staff for athletes. It is understood that the sports ministry gave priority to sports science specialists as they are an integral part of the team.
The sports ministry for the first time also considered what the athletes want. The ministry wanted the teams to have their coaches and sports science staff, who have been associated with them during training and camps. Sports ministry has tried to retain as many names recommended by the National Sports Federations as possible.
In boxing, the ministry has approved five coaches including women’s head coach Santiago Nieva, C Kuttappa, two physios and a doctor. Shooting too has a good number of support staff for 30 shooters. Among an overall staff of 17, 11 are coaches that include High Performance Director Pierre Beauchamp, high performance coach Ronak Pandit, head coach Samaresh Jung. The team will have four physios and two masseurs/recovery experts.
The sports ministry has also said that the expenditure incurred on transfer of boats/equipment/horses for rowing, yachting, canoeing, and any other sports specific requirements, would be reimbursed to the federation concerned by SAl only after ascertaining the reasonability of rate and obtaining a certificate of reasonability from the NSF concerned. There have been issues earlier when the IOA, SAI and the NSFs had differences on the reimbursement policies.
