Badminton star Sindhu opts for London stay

Dubai: India’s badminton star PV Sindhu is in London sorting out her recovery path and diet while setting her sights on the Asian leg of the BWF leg of the calendar for the remainder of the season.

Last week Sindhu — who won a silver at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympic Games — skipped the Indian national team’s training camp for probables preparing for the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games to leave for London to focus on her recovery and nutrition before the start of the badminton season in Asia.

As per the Badminton World Federation (BWF), all tournaments stand cancelled till at least the end of this year with normal activity hopefully returning with the Asian leg of events starting with the HSBC BWF World Tour Super 1000 Asian Open 2020 from January 12 to 17, in Bangkok.

The reigning world champion and current world number six used her social media platform to announce her travel plans. Speaking on Twitter, the 25-year-old Sindhu said that she has been working at the Gatorade Sports Science Institute (GSSI) in London in a bid to improve on her silver medal from the Rio 2016 Olympics. She is now working with Rebecca Randell, a scientist at GSSI.

“Happy to be in England working with GSSI over the next few weeks on my nutrition and recovery with @rrandell86!” Sindhu said.

“Three months to Asia Tour and this is best chance to work on this and improve!”

Sindhu’s preparations for the postponed Tokyo 2020 Games were heavily affected due the COVID-19 pandemic and the Indian only resumed training in August after the opening up of the training facilities in her native Hyderabad.

The Indian has further explained that besides her independence in the British capital she hopes to train along with the players from Team Great Britain during her expected seven to eight-week stay in Europe.

Sindhu also took to social media to clarify that she has had no issues with the training facilities at the camp or with her chief coach, Pullela Gopichand.

She is not the first Indian player with a no-show at a training camp, after her teammate and former world number one Saina Nehwal refused to join the team after her fellow player and husband Parupalli Kashyap was omitted from the Tokyo 2020 set-up.

Further, Sindhu opted out of the Denmark Open that saw the return of Badminton World Federation World Tour competition earlier this month. And although the new dates have not been revealed, it is believed that Sindhu is expected to be part of the Indian team for the Thomas and Uber Cups.

The original August dates for the team competitions in Denmark were rescheduled to October but the events have now indefinitely postponed.