Sports in 2024: A year of promise fulfilled and a reset for the future
Summary
With Gukesh winning the world chess championship and the cricket team lifting the T20 trophy, Indian sportspersons had a successful 2024
He’s too young, they said. Too inexperienced. The temperament was questioned, so was the endurance. But over a fortnight in Toronto in April, and then a historic few days in Singapore in December, Gukesh Dommaraju defied expectations and dispelled all doubts to rocket from prodigy to world champion. He beat an eight-player field to win the FIDE Candidates Tournament 2024 and earn a place at the world championship table.
Also read: The quiet triumph of D. Gukesh
Once there, Gukesh endured a tense, nervy, close-fought match against reigning champion Ding Liren. Like a boxing duel played out in intense silence, Gukesh and Liren went toe-to-toe, battled it out for 14 rounds. In a high-pressure final game, the Chinese grandmaster blinked first. As soon as he blundered on move 55, Liren knew his title had slipped. Gukesh, whose impassive celebration after winning the Candidates had belied his age, dissolved in tears after edging out Liren 7-6. At 18, he had become the youngest chess world champion in the glorious, storied history of the sport.
Gukesh also became the second Indian, after icon and five-time champion Viswanathan Anand, to clinch the world crown. It was the world championship match between Anand and Magnus Carlsen in 2013, which had taken place in Anand’s hometown Chennai, that had fascinated and inspired Gukesh, who was seven at the time.
“When I was in the stands, looking inside the glass box, I thought it would be so cool to be inside one day," he said at a press conference in Singapore. “When Magnus won, I wanted to be the one to bring back the title to India. This dream that I had more than 10 years ago has been the single most important thing in my life so far."
Gukesh’s triumph not only underlined the strides India has taken in world chess in recent times—India also won the men’s and women’s Chess Olympiad in 2024—but also anchored another impressive sporting year for the country. If Indian sport in 2024 ended with Gukesh being crowned the youngest world champion, it had started with Rohan Bopanna becoming the oldest men’s doubles Grand Slam champion. In between, Indians also won a cricket World Cup, six medals at the Olympics and lit up another record-breaking Paralympics.
BETTER WITH AGE
For years, Bopanna had played in the massive shadows cast by Leander Paes, Mahesh Bhupathi and Sania Mirza. While the three of them were headliners, and multiple champions, the tall man from Coorg went about his business quietly. But with Paes and Bhupathi fading away and Mirza calling it quits last year, Bopanna emerged as India’s flagbearer at tennis Grand Slams.
The crowning glory came at the 2024 Australian Open when Bopanna and Matthew Ebden defeated Italians Simone Bolelli and Andrea Vavassori 7-6(0), 7-5 to clinch the men’s doubles title. At 43, Bopanna became the oldest man in the Open Era to win a major men’s doubles title. It was his first men’s doubles title and second Grand Slam overall—he had won the 2017 French Open mixed doubles event. During the tournament, Bopanna also ascended to the top of the world rankings, the oldest first-time World No. 1 in men’s doubles.
While Bopanna’s triumph spoke volumes of his discipline and perseverance, the fact that a player aged over 40 was their best Grand Slam hope shines a light on India’s dismal tennis scene.
Apart from Bopanna, Sumit Nagal is the only Indian who has played at the majors consistently in recent times. Nagal broke into the top 100 of men’s singles for the first time in February this year, and rose to a career-high of 68 in July. The 27-year-old will be aiming to step up in the majors and break the top-50 barrier come 2025.
Also read: How Rohan Bopanna scripted a career renaissance
DOMINANT CHAMPIONS
After their fairytale ending of a home win at the 2023 ODI World Cup ended in anticlimax, a resilient Indian cricket team bounced back to win the 2024 T20 world crown this year. As cricket made a foray into uncharted territory, with the US playing co-host to a World Cup for the very first time, India dominated the competition.
Much like the 2023 ODI World Cup, the Indian team romped into the final unbeaten. It seemed that South Africa would derail the Indian juggernaut, like Australia had in Ahmedabad, as they needed a run a ball (30 off 30) with six wickets in hand while chasing a target of 177. But a clutch performance by the bowlers in the final five overs saw India edge South Africa by seven runs.
It was India’s first world title since the 2011 ODI World Cup triumph. What made the tournament more poignant was that it ensured that Rahul Dravid’s tenure as Indian coach ended on a high. Possibly, it was also the last time that India captain Rohit Sharma and icon Virat Kohli competed in a World Cup.
AGONY AND ECSTASY
If the Tokyo Olympics was a tour de force, Paris provided a reality check for Indian sport. Expectations were high after India’s 2021 outing in the Japanese capital, where they raked in a best-ever haul of seven medals, including a gold by Neeraj Chopra. It was deemed a coming-of-age performance, especially with Chopra winning India’s first medal in track and field.
But progress in the sporting arena is rarely linear. Despite the growing interest, awareness and investment in sport, India could win only six medals in Paris, five of them bronze. Chopra once again gave the Indian contingent a late lift by winning a silver in men’s javelin. Since his historic effort in Tokyo, Chopra had won every big championship in his sport. On 8 August, the day of his competition though, he was done in by a monster throw by Arshad Nadeem.
The Pakistani athlete hurled the javelin to 92.97m on his second attempt. Chopra, who has never broken the 90m-barrier, peaked at 89.45m. On any other day, from any other athlete, a silver would have felt like a win. But not then, not from Chopra.
In many ways, an underlying disappointment coloured India’s Paris Olympic sojourn. Heartbreak stalked the Indian contingent. Vinesh Phogat, who was the face of the wrestlers’ protest since the start of 2023, was denied a chance at playing in the gold-medal match because she was 100g overweight on the day of the final. Weightlifter Mirabai Chanu, a silver medallist in Tokyo, missed the podium by one kilogram. Badminton star Lakshya Sen let a one-game lead slip to lose the bronze-medal match.
In Paris, India had as many medals as they had fourth-place finishes—decidedly the cruellest result at Olympics.
The most heartening results came from the shooting contingent. Written off after their disappointing show in Tokyo, Indian shooters rose to the occasion and won three medals in Paris. While Swapnil Kusale won a bronze in men’s 50m rifle three positions, Manu Bhaker became the first athlete from independent India to win multiple medals at a single Olympics. The 22-year-old from Haryana clinched a bronze in women’s 10m air pistol and then teamed up with Sarabjot Singh for a mixed team 10m air pistol bronze.
The Indian men’s hockey team retained their bronze while Aman Sehrawat made sure that wrestling, which has won at least one medal for India since 2008 Beijing, continued the streak.
At the Paralympics, however, India continued to take massive strides. Indian para-athletes easily superseded their best-ever performance (19 medals, five gold) in Tokyo, by clinching 29 medals (seven gold, nine silver, 13 bronze) in Paris. Shooter Avani Lekhara became the first Indian woman to win two Paralympic golds as she won the Women’s R2 10m air rifle standing SH1 event.
FRESH START
The last three years have been rather hectic for Indian sport. With the covid pandemic deferring the Tokyo Games to 2021, the Olympic cycle before Paris was cut short to three years. We had the Commonwealth Games in 2022 and the Asian Games in 2023. Even by cricket’s rather hectic standards, the last three years have seen breathless action with one men’s ODI World Cup, three men’s T20 World Cups, one women’s ODI World Cup and two women’s T20 World Cups taking place.
But sport should return to its circadian rhythm from next year, with 2025 giving some time to pause and reflect and reset. Many of India’s celebrated medallists from Tokyo, like P.V. Sindhu, Chanu and Bajrang Punia, are fading away. In cricket, the old guard in vanishing—while Kohli and Sharma’s places in white-ball cricket are in doubt, spinner Ravichandran Ashwin announced retirement from international cricket this month. The churn of transition has begun, and as a fresh Olympic cycle begins in 2025, India will be looking for new heroes to lead the way.
Deepti Patwardhan is a sportswriter based in Mumbai.
