India’s national badminton coach Pullela Gopichand said today that India’s Thomas Cup team stays a chance to reach last eight if India’s singles players could deliver strong performances. India is in the same group with Malaysia, South Korea and Germany.
“Our advantage is that we have some good singles players. Although they are not at the same level as Lee Chong Wei, other than that, our singles players have a good chance of defeating anyone else” said Gopichand during a media interaction.
“We are hoping to secure three points against South Korea through our singles. Then, win three points against Malaysia through two singles and one doubles and we have the ability to score all points against Germany,” said Gopi, who was awarded India’s third highest civilian honor – the Padma Bhushan — earlier this year.
However, the India’s chief national badminton coach said that his current target is to reach the quarterfinals at the Thomas and Uber Cups.
“We don’t want to look too far ahead. Our first target is to reach the quarterfinals. In the centralized camp, we have designed different training plan for each individual player preparations. The India team is well prepared and ready to play.” he added.
