Manika Batra reflects on her golden journey in Gold Coast.
If it were a dream, I would have liked it to go on. I wouldn’t have liked to be woken up.
The Commonwealth Games in Gold Coast gave me something that I believed was possible. But there is always a difference in believing in your potential and realising it on the big stage. In these Games, a dream turned into reality, potential turned into timely performance and India, as a team, proved what selfbelief was capable of changing. The results, I would like to believe, have done their bit to change a mindset for the better.
Personally, for me, four medals from four events is nothing short of a fairytale. To play my part in the historic team championship triumph and to follow it up in the singles is still to sink in.
To add medals from the two doubles is like finding the missing pieces of a jigsaw puzzle.
Let me begin from the point when we defeated England 30 in the team semi finals. I told my teammates, let us not think too much about the final now. We’ll take rest.
Individually, we all had our minds thinking about the matches in the final.We stayed upbeat and believed that Singapore was beatable. I kept repeating that we could make history since no Indian wo men’s team had ever won the Common wealth Games gold.
The biggest reason behind this optim ism was the fact that all three of us — Mouma Di (Das), Madhurika (Patkar) and I — were in good shape and playing very well. TheMoumaMadhurika doubles combination was pulling off match after match after the defeat against Wales. That’s why I said in the meeting that it was important to win the doubles. I assured the team of giving my best in my two singles. Just before the final, our coach Max (Massimo Costantini) also boosted our confidence.
Diese Geschichte stammt aus der May 19, 2018-Ausgabe von Sportstar.
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Diese Geschichte stammt aus der May 19, 2018-Ausgabe von Sportstar.
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