‘Coaching days end here’ Mathias Boe, who shaped India’s badminton duo Satwik-Chirag and taught them how to beat Chinese, retires

There’s an involuntary twitch that coach Mathias Boe would get in his shoulder every time Chirag Shetty whizzed across for a net kill or Satwiksairaj Rankireddy leapt for a smash, while he watched them train or play. Like it was him playing. He wouldn’t have checked twice if the parachute worked while jumping out a plane if that’s what it took to shepherd Satwik-Chirag

At any given moment, and if he had been permitted, Boe looked like he would have jumped onto the court and started playing for India himself. He soared with them, and when their Olympics dream came crashing down in the quarters, the intense Danish character declared he was done with coaching altogether.

In an Insta post, Boe said, “For me, my coaching days end here, I’m not going to continue in India or anywhere else, for now at least. I have spent too much time in a badminton hall and it’s pretty stressful to be a coach, I’m a tired old man. ()”

The hurt of the loss cut deep and the badminton addict, obsessed with the sport, will look to regain some normalcy in life.

A coach deeply invested in the success of the duo, whose wins drew out hilarious dance moves and jumping on couches if he was watching a match on streams from afar, Boe had taken them to Asian Games title and World No 1 with his professorial coaching. He would literally stand alongside them on practice courts and drill in everything from psychology of a flat game to energy needed for a tall attack. He was a big believer in perennially bouncing on toes when on court, so the movement and momentum wouldn’t stop. “Be alert” were the standard barking instructions, to keep the two giants, prone to brooding or going into a shell, eternally agile.

Paris: India’s Chirag Shetty with coach Mathias Boe after the men’s doubles quarterfinal badminton match against Malaysia’s Aaron Chia and Soh Wooi Yik at the 2024 Summer Olympics, in Paris, France, Thursday, Aug. 1, 2024. Indian duo of Shetty and Satwiksairaj Rankireddy lost the match. (PTI Photo/Ravi Choudhary)

When the fall came with a thud at Paris, the ambitious Dane who rebelliously believed he could beat every dominant Asian team, empathised. “I know the feeling all too well myself. Pushing yourself to the limit everyday, to be in the best shape of your life, and then things don’t go as you had hoped for. I know you guys are gutted, I know how much you wanted to bring a medal back to India, but this time it wasn’t meant to be,” he would write.

The London Games silver medallist who hit the coaching ground running with an overlapping playing career, after he struck a bond with Chirag Shetty at Goregaon Sports Complex in Mumbai, had straddled professional duties, while staying away from his Danish home for months. Married this March to Indian actor Tapsee Pannu, it had still been a struggle to spend extended stints away from home in Denmark, while guiding two Olympic careers. Even coaches face burnouts.

Exceedingly bright, and with a business acumen for investing in international markets, Boe was consumed by badminton coaching, but not solely reliant on this. Like most elite Danish athletes, his post-playing transition was to be smoother. Until he met Chirag and was persuaded to take the Indians up the climbing ranks.

India never had a great tradition in men’s doubles. But Boe made the talented and tall Indians, with power as raw material, believe they could compete with the Chinese, Indonesians and Koreans. He taught Chirag, a near 6 footer to bend at the net when receiving and chiselled him into an ace front court player. Theoretically strong with extensive notes in his scribbled black notebook, Boe deciphered tactics and strategy against the established powerhouses for the eager Indians.

He injected them with confidence even after they had lost 8 times to Malaysians Aaron Chia and Soh Wooi Yik, and equipped them with weapons to match their Far East thinking pickled in generations of doubles knowledge. Boe had himself waded into epic wars with the leading Chinese and Koreans of the day, winning some, losing many while defying their supremacy. An All England title and London silver were his rewards but he nursed regrets of not having won gold. He believed Satwik-Chirag were capable, but the trio fell short.

Amongst his handful of criticisms, was Boe’s inability to get Satwik Chirag the world title, and a painful loss in quarters of 2023 World Championships at Copenhagen to Danish Astrup-Rasmussen. The Olympics loss will rankle. He couldn’t quite crack the code of serve variations that opponents were throwing at the Indians. And the Indians couldn’t keep their nerve in the Olympic quarterfinals, despite their best efforts to calm down. They just might need a fresh Malaysian or Indonesian brain to add those layers to their skill set.

A strict coach that made Satwik-Chirag punctual, disciplined their training and gave them the pure assurance of being elite in their strokes and thinking, Boe has taken them a step further. But Boe took the Olympic loss personally. He cared enough to dump his coaching aspirations at 44. It’s difficult to believe he’s really done with badminton, but shuttle’s most famous sulk & snarl can take time to cool down.

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