Parents wary to send children for training: Sushil Kumar

Sushil Kumar’s coaching on the Chhatrasal Stadium was diminished to primary health regime through the lockdown. His private coach Kamal Malikov had additionally returned to Dagestan, Russia whereas trainees on the Chhatrasal Stadium, one of many prime wrestling centres within the nation, had been despatched house.

The Chhatrasal Stadium has now reopened, however Sushil, who can also be answerable for the Delhi authorities centre, mentioned it could take a while for the coaching to begin. The two-time Olympic medallist mentioned in a full contact spot like wrestling, coaching could be troublesome and fogeys worry for the security of their kids.

“Russian Olympic champion (Abdulrashid) Sadulaev had tested positive for COVID-19. I spoke to him yesterday. He is fine now and has come negative in the recent test. Generally, the assumption is that sportspersons have strong immunity level and we won’t get it but it just shows that we too are vulnerable,” mentioned Sushil.

“We have opened the centre and sanitized the facility. We will decide on Monday how to go about resumption of training but the input we are getting from parents is that they are fearful of sending kids for training right now.”

A Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) has been made for the centre and Sushil mentioned they’d start with a small group of trainees. “We cannot have everyone training together the way we used to do earlier. Only one or two kids can be allowed to train on the mat at a time. The training schedule has to be different too. We have to be very careful and start step wise taking all precautions because safety is the priority,” he mentioned.

Two of Chhatrasal Stadium trainees Deepak Punia (86kg) and Ravi Dahiya (57kg) have certified for the Tokyo Olympics. Punia has gone again house to his village Chhara in Jhajjar, whereas Dahiya is on the centre.

“There are only seven-eight wrestlers who stayed back at the Chhatrasal Stadium and we are doing physical fitness,” mentioned Dahiya. “We do not want to rush back to mat training. There is a spike in cases and everyone feels it is better to wait for some more time,” he mentioned.

The Wrestling Federation of India, too, has determined towards holding a nationwide camp. The Sports Authority of India (SAI) SOPs have strict restrictions for wrestling. It consists of no human sparring – sparring is allowed with private dummies with just one wrestler per mat at a time. Also, gymnasium can’t be used.