Hyderabad: Badminton player Saina Nehwal, who was down with chicken pox two weeks ago, is confident about her preparation for the World Badminton Championships (WBC).
"I am fully fit now. I practiced in full steam for the last two to three days. I did not feel any weakness during the practise. It's only after the first match that I will be able to judge myself in a better way," she said.
The tournament will begin in Hyderabad on Monday under a thick security blanket after England's last-minute withdrawal left other participating countries anxious about their safety.
More than 250 players from 42 countries will be competing in the six-day event.
The championships is the first of the series of world-class sporting event that India would be hosting ahead of the 2010 Commonwealth Games in Delhi.
Saina is India's biggest hope in the event. She had been riding high on form and won her maiden Super Series event in Indonesia in June this year.
Her coach Pullela Gopichand is also hopeful about Saina's performance.
The 19-year-old, who has got a bye in the first round, is banking on her home advantage to put up a strong performance in the championships.
Saina will meet Anastasia Prokopenko of Russia in the second round. Prokopenko got a walkover in her first round match against Olga Konon of Poland.
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The success of the event would go a long way in projecting India as a safe venue, after repeated concerns of visiting nations post-Mumbai terror attacks of November 26 last year.
The Australian Davis Cup team had refused to travel to Chennai in May this year for the crucial third round tie and now the English badminton team has flown back home.
Earlier also they pulled out of the Indian Open in March on security concerns.
Since the reports of possible LeT attacks, a multi-layered security arrangement has been put in place at the Gachibowli Stadium (the venue for the World Championships), Pullela Gopichand's academy (the training venue) and the team hotels.
Players, officials and media are being frisked and also checked through metal detectors at multiple places. Even team buses ferrying players from hotels to the venue are being screened.
The security arrangements are going to become tighter once the tournament gets under way on Monday.
Sayali Gokhale and Aditi Mutatkar are the other two Indian players in the women's singles draw.
Also, the world No 8 mixed doubles pair of Jwala Gutta and V Diju is expected to put up a strong show after their recent international successes.
In the men's singles, Chetan Anand (world No 15) will play South Korean Ji Hoon Hong on Monday while Arvind Bhat (world No 24) has a tough first round match against ninth seed Chinese Taipei's Yu Hsien Hsieh, who has beaten the Indian twice before.
The promising Parupalli Kashyap, who has got a wild card, might not face any difficulty in getting past Iran's Ali Shah Hosseini in the first round.
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