Asiad done, now time to talk about medal tally

Representation pic

It is a wrap as the Asian Games signed off from Japan yesterday. Predictably, we will and we should too, have debates, commentary, critique and analysis of our medal count, where we fell short compared to four years earlier and what we can take away from these Games.

Though India has fallen short on the medal count, we have had a furious wag of the tail in the last few days and the country hauled in the gold, climbing several rungs on the medal ladder.

Now introspect and the take action on why certain medals slipped away from our grasp. Then, why if for reasons to be ascertained and then worked on, we slipped a few notches below in certain games. Take heart from medals in ‘unexpected' sport. Take for instance, sepak takraw, can we build on that sport? Can we pay more attention to certain ‘breakthrough' medals, see if we can build more infrastructure and provide more amenities and avenues to those games so that we start climbing the ladder regularly.

With so much exchange and interaction with other athletes, is there some where in the entire sporting ecosystem where we fall short, generically, and can we improve on that? We are strong traditionally in certain sports but can we start building a rock solid foundation in others?

We want our mental health experts to start working with our athletes post return, so that any immediate concerns, the mindset can be looked at post Games. They too can contribute to a turnaround. While the athletes may take a few turns to rest and recoup, much work needs to be done by all support groups. The LA 2028 Olympics are only two years away. The clock is ticking.