Gopichand satisfied with Varma's performance

Chief national badminton coach Pullela Gopichand is satisfied with Sourabh Varma's performance despite his losing the men's singles final at the $120,000 Malaysia Grand Prix Gold at Johor Bahru Sunday.

The Indian shuttler gave a fantastic fight to Indonesian Simon Santoso but eventually went down 21-15, 16-21, 19-21 in a marathon encounter which lasted an hour and nine minutes.

"It was a close match but nevertheless a good performance. I am happy because he is back with his consistent performances. He won in Austria as well as in Iran and then he reaches a Grand Prix final. He has shown maturity which has not developed overnight," Gopichand said here.

Before going to Malaysia, Varma had also won two Tier IV events -- Austrian International Challenge and Iran Fajr International Challenge -- in February.

"This goes to show that our country is producing quality players like Kidambi Srikanth, Parupalli Kashyap who reached the Swiss Open semifinal. Then we had Arvind Bhat win in Germany. On the women's side we have had semifinal results. So one or the other has performed at international events for us," added the former All-England champion and the Dronacharya Awardee.

He concluded that his proteges just need to get more consistent.

"We just need to get more consistent with these players as they are young. Hopefully, by the next couple of years, we will get more consistent performances from them."