The women's kabaddi team from Denmark lost its second match against Indian eves on Thursday by a huge margin but earned accolades from the audience which was clearly impressed by the fight put up by the visitors.
For all 13 players of Denmark, kabaddi used to be 'touch-and- run' game
before they watched videos uploaded on YouTube regarding its rules and regulations.
"YouTube zindabad" was all the Denmark women's team manager Prabhjit Singh could say after the visitor's match against India during the third edition of Kabaddi World Cup in Sangrur.
Prabhjit said that it took two months to train Denmark women, who are participating in the tournament for the first time, in order to ensure better performance during the tournament.
"YouTube helped us a lot as women players were completely ignorant about the sport in the beginning. The players were shown videos of kabaddi matches regularly so that they got to understand the sport in a better way. No CDs were brought from India as ample number of videos are available on YouTube," he said.
"Gore jaldi sikhde ne (the white people grasp things more easily)," Prabhjit remarked.
Denmark team captain Joy Bentzen said that it was very difficult in the beginning but things became easy later on. "We have closely watched videos on YouTube and tried to learn the maximum from kabaddi visuals, especially from Punjab," she said.
Singh said all members of the Denmark team were university students who had launched kabaddi club in Athletic University in Denmark and at other educational institutions.
"We will propose to the country's government to begin kabaddi league in coming months on the format of football leagues to promote the sport across the nation," the manager said.
Denmark has become the first non-Asian country to accord recognition to kabaddi in their national sports calendar.