Commonwealth Games 2018

[Mage]

Why not? The shooters did well, why not take that as place to start?

Nah....cricket is the only game where BD can be ranked in top 10 in the world. And they can get lucky and win some matches then think they are the best.

Games like shooting and other athletics like swimming has no following in BD. Football used to be popular. I mean local football with local clubs playing was a big thing a decade or two back. But it has died as well. Now people prefer Champions league or Spanish league.

 

[Nilgiri]

Nah....cricket is the only game where BD can be ranked in top 10 in the world. And they can get lucky and win some matches then think they are the best.

Games like shooting and other athletics like swimming has no following in BD. Football used to be popular. I mean local football with local clubs playing was a big thing a decade or two back. But it has died as well. Now people prefer Champions league or Spanish league.

I was gonna suggest pole vaulting, but nvm...

But in all honesty, BD needs to inculcate a few more things past cricket and desi level soccer. You need the one breakthrough by somebody....who then does a dedicated follow up.

But anyway I guess sports is not really too important yet in the grand scheme of things afflicting the region.

 

[Gibbs]

So you can see from this, even what we are medalling in CWG means next to no results at olympics when we gotta face things like the Cubans (who treat boxing like we do cricket, its matter of national honour etc). We need to overhaul entire infrastructure (esp the "software" part), its not only funding issue. Then only is it even possible to attract the real best of the coaches and trainers too....they also need to feel like their efforts will bear real fruit...past what they are paid (that they can get from many places given the demand) etc.

Only with the "Software" commitment (to follow the hardware i.e funding + infra) can we get real results. The best example I have seen in reasonable time frame with not much previous heritage is Indian Badminton. It is quite the story of triumph of one man with vision and real commitment (Pulela Gopichand) backed up with a number of allies too. Now they are really dominating and perpetuating self-driven momentum from it, more medals there in olympics are just a matter of time. I want to see this model adapted in many more places in South Asia.

@Gibbs

I'm kinda happy i have been proven wrong.. India has achieved some great results since they hosted the CWG in Delhi, I guess that was the catalyst, With the right investment and it's massive talent pool it's obvious now the country is going places

 

[Nilgiri]

I'm kinda happy i have been proven wrong.. India has achieved some great results since they hosted the CWG in Delhi, I guess that was the catalyst, With the right investment and it's massive talent pool it's obvious now the country is going places

A good read why this CWG result is a real watershed moment (we must however stay focused on improving more than rest on still largely the yet to be earned laurels imho) :

http://www.espn.in/commonwealth-games/story/_/id/23185220/why-gold-coast-india-best-cwg-ever

Ugra: Why Gold Coast is India's best CWG ever

Want to know what was special about Gold Coast? It was India's best Commonwealth Games, and there are a few good reasons why.

Of India's 66 medals, there are as many as 26 golds. More than their silvers, more than their bronzes. It is not a proportion that Indians are used to in the multi-discipline games that matter. Nor is India's third-place finish on the CWG medals table the first time they have ever finished that high outside the 2010 Delhi Games. Let's not get ahead of ourselves and dream of world domination, though, as the Asian Games up in August will be a far tougher event.

But if we number crunch, then these 26 golds fit in at No.3 in India's overall CWG count: there's the heady 39 from Delhi 2010 and 30 from Manchester 2002. So, was Gold Coast India's third-best CWG ever?

Actually, it was arguably its best. Take a closer look into Manchester's 30 and Delhi's 39. Manchester's 30 came from five sports: boxing, hockey, shooting, weightlifting and wrestling. Delhi's golds had a wider spread of nine: archery, athletics, badminton, boxing, shooting, table tennis, tennis, weightlifting and wrestling. Gold Coast 2018 covered seven: athletics, badminton, boxing, shooting, table tennis, weightlifting, wrestling.

Look closer at the 30 golds from Manchester. There were 14 from shooting and 11 in weightlifting, in a manner that medals are no longer awarded in international competition. Weightlifting has trimmed the number of medals it handed out in Manchester: nine in every weight category - snatch/ clean & jerk/ overall.

Shooting doesn't hold the pairs events any more. Of India's 14 shooting golds in Manchester, they won eight in the pairs and six in individual. Of the 11 weightlifting golds in the same game, India won four overall medals, and seven in the other smaller categories - either for snatch or clean & jerk. Every gold medallist from Manchester earned their medals fair and square and deserved every accolade and reward that followed. Had Gold Coast followed Manchester's medal distribution pattern, India's tally would have easily zoomed beyond 2002's 30 golds.

Yet, how does the Gold Coast count go beyond Delhi? Simple. Because India's performances came without home advantage or the inclusion of sports that suited them. Like archery, tennis and Greco-roman wrestling in Delhi 2010, Gold Coast 2018 picked beach volleyball, diving and mountain biking.

The Gold Coast Games has served notice that our athletes are pushing, striving and moving forward. The 20 silvers tell us how close they came. Personal bests in tough track and field events are signs of what abilities lie among them.

In the names and faces of shooters Manu Bhaker and Anish Bhanwala, table tennis players Manika Batra and G Sathiyan, athletes Neeraj Chopra and Hima Das, weightlifter Mirabai Chanu, wrestler Bajrang Punia and boxer Gaurav Solanki, lie the heart and soul of India's athletic aspiration for the Games cycle of the upcoming Asian Games in Jakarta and the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo.

India's best ever Commonwealth Games has the power to become the launch pad to what they must be dreaming are the larger achievements ahead of them.

At a time like this, on a day like today, for Indian sport, it should be seat belts on, everyone.

========

@ranjeet @waz @jhungary @Jackdaws @911 @bhutjolokia @HariPrasad @KapitaanAli @luckych

 

[911]

A good read why this CWG result is a real watershed moment (we must however stay focused on improving more than rest on still largely the yet to be earned laurels imho) :

http://www.espn.in/commonwealth-games/story/_/id/23185220/why-gold-coast-india-best-cwg-ever

Ugra: Why Gold Coast is India's best CWG ever

Want to know what was special about Gold Coast? It was India's best Commonwealth Games, and there are a few good reasons why.

Of India's 66 medals, there are as many as 26 golds. More than their silvers, more than their bronzes. It is not a proportion that Indians are used to in the multi-discipline games that matter. Nor is India's third-place finish on the CWG medals table the first time they have ever finished that high outside the 2010 Delhi Games. Let's not get ahead of ourselves and dream of world domination, though, as the Asian Games up in August will be a far tougher event.

But if we number crunch, then these 26 golds fit in at No.3 in India's overall CWG count: there's the heady 39 from Delhi 2010 and 30 from Manchester 2002. So, was Gold Coast India's third-best CWG ever?

Actually, it was arguably its best. Take a closer look into Manchester's 30 and Delhi's 39. Manchester's 30 came from five sports: boxing, hockey, shooting, weightlifting and wrestling. Delhi's golds had a wider spread of nine: archery, athletics, badminton, boxing, shooting, table tennis, tennis, weightlifting and wrestling. Gold Coast 2018 covered seven: athletics, badminton, boxing, shooting, table tennis, weightlifting, wrestling.

Look closer at the 30 golds from Manchester. There were 14 from shooting and 11 in weightlifting, in a manner that medals are no longer awarded in international competition. Weightlifting has trimmed the number of medals it handed out in Manchester: nine in every weight category - snatch/ clean & jerk/ overall.

Shooting doesn't hold the pairs events any more. Of India's 14 shooting golds in Manchester, they won eight in the pairs and six in individual. Of the 11 weightlifting golds in the same game, India won four overall medals, and seven in the other smaller categories - either for snatch or clean & jerk. Every gold medallist from Manchester earned their medals fair and square and deserved every accolade and reward that followed. Had Gold Coast followed Manchester's medal distribution pattern, India's tally would have easily zoomed beyond 2002's 30 golds.

Yet, how does the Gold Coast count go beyond Delhi? Simple. Because India's performances came without home advantage or the inclusion of sports that suited them. Like archery, tennis and Greco-roman wrestling in Delhi 2010, Gold Coast 2018 picked beach volleyball, diving and mountain biking.

The Gold Coast Games has served notice that our athletes are pushing, striving and moving forward. The 20 silvers tell us how close they came. Personal bests in tough track and field events are signs of what abilities lie among them.

In the names and faces of shooters Manu Bhaker and Anish Bhanwala, table tennis players Manika Batra and G Sathiyan, athletes Neeraj Chopra and Hima Das, weightlifter Mirabai Chanu, wrestler Bajrang Punia and boxer Gaurav Solanki, lie the heart and soul of India's athletic aspiration for the Games cycle of the upcoming Asian Games in Jakarta and the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo.

India's best ever Commonwealth Games has the power to become the launch pad to what they must be dreaming are the larger achievements ahead of them.

At a time like this, on a day like today, for Indian sport, it should be seat belts on, everyone.

========

@ranjeet @waz @jhungary @Jackdaws @911 @bhutjolokia @HariPrasad @KapitaanAli @luckych

Ty for the tag brother. I actually stumbled upon this article myself few days back. This commonwealth games was our best and this article is absolutely spot on. In Manchester, weightlifting had 3 gold medals for same weight category (Snatch, Clean & Jerk and Overall) while later it was changed to 1 gold medal per weight category. This time we won 5 gold, 2 silver and 2 bronze in weightlifting, but if it was Manchester we would have had 15 gold, 8 silver and 4 bronze. I already talked about the limit in participation in shooting events and why single even athletes could not participate despite winning gold at world cup earlier this year, in my earlier post. Also for the first time we did better than any other nation in Badminton and Table Tennis. It could have been better in Badminton if poor Ashwini wasn't playing like 3 games a day. Now we need to shift focus on other events for future such as Swimming, Diving, Gymnastics, Cycling, etc if we want to increase our medal tally. Unfortunately unlike Shooting and Boxing which saw rapid improvement over last 15 years, these events will require much more time I think.