Following the outbreak of the pandemic COVID’19 virus, which has stopped all sporting activities around the globe, Vimal Kumar, who is an ex-Chief Badminton Coach on Tuesday, pleaded with the government to allow athletes who are Olympic bound to progress with their training after undergoing the necessary test.

By the respective directives by the Telangana and Karnataka governments, the academies in Hyderabad and Bangalore [ Pullela Gopichand Academy and Prakash Padukone] have been closed down for two weeks.

PV Sindhu, who is also a Rio silver medalist, B.Sai Praneeth, Chirag Shetty, and Satwiksairaj Rankireddy, are the shuttlers who have secured a place for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics.

Vimal revealed in an exclusive interview that he really feels sad for the sports community at large as they have got good immunity unlike the public out there and they  also  follow strict diets with healthy lifestyle. ” i am urging the governmnet to look at ways to run a test on the athletes who have already secured qualifications to train and keep fit.

“I wouldn’t have said such things like this, but Considering being an Olympic year, which comes every four years it will be advisable they undergo strict testing and if some test positive, i believe they will recover in two weeks time”.

Vimal also pointed to the fact that other counties like Korea, Japan and China have their shutter training in other countries but such is not the case in India as they are being treated differently.

The deadly coronavirus have killed more than 7,000 people worldwide while people infected have grown to over 175,000.

However in India, 100 people have tested positive so far apart from the three recorded deaths.

The Virus has caused major competions in all sporting events to be either cancelled or postponed

Written by: Olumide Akinnifesi