Rajesh Dhar
Though, the State of Jammu and Kashmir has already succeeded in crafting a space on the Country’s Sports Map, yet the culture of training in Sports Academies, Coaching Centres and Sports Clubs, which was not a custom in the past, is playing a pivotal role in shaping careers of budding sportspersons, helping the State in producing international stuff to serve it at the national scene.
The existence of the Sports Academies and Allied Coaching Centres in the State, attracts kids and their parents towards them and the youngsters, who possess motor-ability, reflexes and anticipation are molded to become top sportspersons of the Country.
Presence of Sports Academies, has not only brought sea change in Sports Culture of the State, but also has lured the youngsters to take sports as a career. Otherwise, earlier, the youngsters used to participate in sports and games to make full use of their leisure and enjoy sporting events as recreational activities.
Presently, this region can boast of having galaxy of Sports Academies and Coaching Centres in the major sports disciplines of Table Tennis, Handball, Basketball, Snooker, Kabaddi, Boxing, Gymnastics, Fencing and Cricket etc, and their presence can be gauged from the fact that the State of Jammu and Kashmir has won good number of medals including gold medals also in various sports disciplines at the National and International scene.
The performance of the players and coaches from the State in 35th National Games at Kerala in the disciplines of Gymnastics, Boxing, Fencing, Wushu etc, is testimony to the fact as to how drastically the performance graph of the sportspersons has increased in last two to three years.
In Gymnastics, Arjuna Awardee and India Coach, Krupali Singh, SP Singh, Manisha and others, run Coaching and training classes at MA Stadium and the performance of their trainees like Palak Kour and Mitali Dogra at the National Level speaks volumes about their coaching abilities.
Fencing Coaches Chotu Lal and Rachna Jamwal have the distinction of producing international stuff including Vishal Thappa, Rashid Ahmed etc by running their regular training classes at MA Stadium.
Anil Wadhera, Boxing Coach has produced quality stuff by running regular training classes in Jammu, while in basketball, handball, speedball etc regular training classes are being run by the experts of these games at various centres in Jammu, to hone skill of the players with an aim to produce quality stuff.
In Table Tennis, Stag Academy has been established at Nanak Nagar in Jammu, under the supervision of Ramesh Magotra, which since its establishment has organized around five standard tournaments in Jammu, helping young peddlers to polish and fine-tune their skill and talent.
In the game of Cricket, there are many Academies, Clubs and Coaching Centres, wherein the youngsters are receiving coaching and training, under the expert coaches and trainers.
Leading from the front in this race are KC Sports Club (Yuvraj Singh Centre of Excellence), Sehwag Cricket Academy, Mayank Goswami Cricket Academy, Col RN Chopra Cricket Academy, Sidhant Cricket Academy, besides regular Coaching Centre at MA Stadium.
The contribution of the cricket coaches including Randhir Singh Manhas (Rajan), Virender Sharma, Ravi Sharma, Sunil Kumar and others in honing skill of the players in these Centres is highly laudable as Jammu and Kashmir can boast of having a galaxy of talented cricketers, who possess all that is required to blossom at the highest level.
Sehwag Cricket Academy was inaugurated by internationally famed cricketer Virender Sehwag in the month of May, 2015 at Heritage School in Sainik Colony, Jammu. The young cricket aspirants were bestowed tips by Virender Sehwag and Mithun Manhas. Manhas visits off and on to the Academy to train the youngsters, apart from the regular coaches.
KC Sports Club, under Yuvraj Singh Centre of Excellence was inaugurated by J&K Ranji Trophy skipper and the only player who represented Team India, Parvez Rasool and the experts from the Yuvraj Singh Centre of Excellence from Chandigarh also.
Many youngsters of the State, as on date, involve themselves with these Academies and Training Centres to shape their careers.
The lack of sufficient infrastructure provided by the Government, is being replenished by these Sports Academies and Coaching Centres. Sportspersons of the State are being lured by the infrastructural facilities in these Centres, which in turn enhance sports culture and helps the State in producing International stuff, besides enabling youngsters to make their careers.
Now, parents have no hesitation in sending their children to these Academies, even at a tender age to catch them young and coach them, as sports has become a career option in the present era.
It is only these Academies, which can help youngsters to rectify their mistakes, besides providing opportunity to the coaches to work on the skeletal assessment, fitness and skill of the players during the off-season.
“Presence of Sports Academies in the State of Jammu and Kashmir is a step forward in promoting sports at the grass-root level, as they provide standard infrastructural facilities and platform to them for polishing their skill and talent up to the maximum level,” said Sunil Joshi, former Test cricketer and coach of J&K Ranji Trophy team.
“KC Sports Club, apart from having a standard Gym and allied facilities, has the distinction of having nine artificial turfs (9 pitches), with four fast bowling strips and five spinning tracks in its mega indoor cricket hall. This facility is unique in the entire Country and helps the youngsters to feel aroma of quality practicing surfaces,” said Arjun Choudhary, Managing Director of the Club.
Follow our WhatsApp channel
