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Coronavirus: Indian women wrestling team's coach Andrew Cook leaves for US
Cook was with the Indian women's team at SAI centre in Lucknow but only four to five wrestlers were there since most of them did not report after the Holi.
Indian women wrestling team's foreign coach Andrew Cook has left for the US after the national federation suspended the camps in Lucknow and Sonepat in the wake of COVID-19 pandemic.
Cook was with the Indian women's team at SAI centre in Lucknow but only four to five wrestlers were there since most of them did not report after the Holi. The Indian coach at the camp, Kuldeep Malik, has also left for his home in Haryana after an upset stomach and fever.
The Indian men's team is yet to get a new foreign coach after Iranian Hossein Karimi left his job midway due to various factors. "The coronavirus outbreak has shut the camp. I need not be stuck alone there, but (I'm) here with my family until we resume camp," Cook told PTI from Seattle.
"I am with my wife and dog and it's so great. In Lucknow, I would have been solo. It wasn't worth sitting alone there when I miss my family," he added.
The Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) said it makes sense if people stay at home in the prevailing circumstances. "Cook has gone on leave. In the situation that we are facing, everybody wants to be with his family. Cook wanted to go, so we let him since there is no national camp. Wrestlers are also training on their own," WFI Assistant secretary Vinod Tomar said. The WFI staff, instead of working from home, are still coming to office since they have to settle accounts with the SAI before month-end.
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