Is Jwala Gutta, the star doubles shuttler on the brink of retirement?
Recent developments in various media reports indicate that as it has been reliably learnt that Jwala has been appointed as one of the coaches for the Indian team that will be take part in the Australia Open SuperSeries next month.
When contacted recently Jwala refused to talk about this topic but divulged her future plans. The only Indian to feature in two doubles events at the London Olympics, Jwala has made immense contribution to team events. She along with Ashwini Ponnappa won a bronze at the World Championships and gold at the 2010 Commonwealth Games.
After 18 years on the circuit, she has launched the Global Academy for Badminton (GAB) along with Franchise India in March but had then said that she would continue as a player. However, her playing days may end once she travels with the team as a coach.
Unlike other traditional academies, Jwala’s venture will focus on catering to the needs of several budding shuttlers. “The idea is to give more facilities to players and provide apart from coaching, support to talented shuttlers like funding, foreign tours, top class coaching etc. The basic idea is to create a franchise. There are a lot of underused stadia and school courts. Now many are looking up to badminton just for physical fitness. We want to create professional centres over there so that we give an option of picking badminton as a profession,” said Jwala, adding that her academies will spread all over the country.
