Sports: Commonwealth Games and India-Go for Gold

Indian athletes have fared better in the Commonwealth than in the Olympics

The 22nd Commonwealth Games are being hosted by England from this week. This is the third time for England to host the Games after London in 1934 and Manchester in 2002. A total of 20 games have been organized in this edition in which 4131 athletes from 72 countries will participate.

If we look at the medal tally of the Commonwealth Games, we will realize that Australia is leading the tally with more than 2400 medals. England is second with 2144 medals, Canada is third with 1550+ medals and India is fourth with 503 medals. Placement in the medal tally is determined by the number of gold medals won by those countries. Indian athletes have fared better in the Commonwealth than in the Olympics.

India will send 215 athletes to compete in different sports at the Commonwealth Games this year. Indian athletes are most likely to win maximum medals in boxing, shooting, archery and wrestling events. Looking at India’s performance in the history of the Commonwealth Games, India has dominated mainly in 4 Games. Boxing, Shooting, Badminton and Wrestling. But this year shooting and archery events have not been included due to lack of logistics and infrastructure. What new games have been included?

The Commonwealth Games Executive Board has added the sports of women’s cricket (T-20 format), beach volleyball, para table tennis, 3×3 basketball and 3×3 wheelchair basketball in this edition. In which events can a medal be expected?

1) Athletics: Gold medal in javelin throw can be expected from Neeraj Chopra who won silver medal in the recently concluded World Athletics Championship. Tejashwan Shankar in high jump and Hima Das and Dooti Chand in track and field are strong contenders for medals.

2) Badminton: P.V. Considering the form of Sindhu, Kidambi Srikanth, Lakshya Sen, Satwik Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty, India is likely to win at least 4 gold medals in badminton.

3) Boxing: World champion Nikhat Zareen will represent India in the 50 kg category. Apart from that, Olympic bronze medalist Lovelyna Borghain, Olympic silver medalist Amit Panghal and Asian Championship gold medalist Sanjit Kumar can win gold for India.

4) Table Tennis: Given that the men’s and women’s teams created history by winning gold medals in the last Commonwealth Games, there is every chance of a repeat this time. Manika Batra in the women’s team and Sathya Gunasekaran or Sharath Kamal in the men’s team are capable of winning the gold medal in the singles event.