Coaches from other sports, too, echo Gopichand’s concern.
Delhi-based Sandeep Gupta, Dronacharya awardee and head coach at Stag Table Tennis Academy, said even the training leading up to the sports career is quite expensive. “Sports like badminton, table tennis and tennis are costly sports. For instance, one pair of rubbers in a table tennis bat alone costs ₹15,000 and must be changed every month. Coaching and travel expenses are additional costs,” said Gupta, who has coached table tennis Olympians Manika Batra and Neha Aggarwal.
Hyderabad-based Meera Khandelwal, who is training her daughter Tishya Khandelwal to be a tennis player, knows this too well. Meera, an interior designer, and her husband Hemant Khandelwal expect to spend nearly ₹45 lakh a year on the 19-year-old’s training in Australia next year onwards.
“She is going to Melbourne as it has better training facilities and sports career opportunities. She is pursuing B. Tech (first year) at BITS Pilani and has been allowed to move to Melbourne on a foreign exchange programme where she can pursue her tennis career alongside finishing college,” Mira said.
Tishya’s parents enrolled her in professional tennis training at the age of 10, and she has won several national and international competitions at the junior level. “When she was 12-13 years old, we decided to enrol her in the Justine Henin Academy in Europe to help her play ITF (International Tennis Federation) juniors. We had spent about €6,900 ( ₹6.51 lakh according to the current exchange rate) for the two-month training in 2019,” she recalled.
In the last six to seven years, Meera is estimated to have spent about ₹20 lakh annually (barring the covid-19 period) on her daughter’s training, including equipment, travel, physiotherapy, nutritionists, etc.
To be sure, expenses in Tishya’s case were higher as her parents encouraged her to participate in international tennis tournaments crucial for global exposure and securing a high ITF ranking. A high rank opens up access to high-level tournaments. However, many players choose to play in ITF tournaments held in India in the early years as that helps save on travel-related expenses.
Mint spoke to other parents like Meera and sportspeople to find out what it costs to train a champion and how rewarding a career in sports could be in the long term.
The cost
For most sports, expenses start picking up around 12-13 years of age when the child has to start professional training. In Noida, Arpit Jain’s 11-year-old son Nakul is training at a cricket academy. Currently, Jain spends ₹10,000 per quarter on academy fees and an additional ₹6,000 per month on a personal coach. He expects these expenses to rise to ₹1 lakh per month as his son advances to a more rigorous training setup.
“I intend to send him to Irfan Pathan’s academy or train him under a coach with international exposure. It will cost much more than what I’m spending now, but it’s important for Nakul to improve his game as the local academy’s training methods are outdated,” he said.
As the child starts competing in tournaments, there is an opportunity to earn monetary rewards. But that requires international travel, which is the case with almost all sports except cricket, and rewards hardly cover a small fraction of the travel, hotel and other costs involved in participating in a tournament.
For instance, the ITF tournaments Tishya took part in had a prize reward of $15,000, which was distributed among winners, finalists, semifinalists and even some early-round players. In badminton, prize money for young players ranges from ₹20,000-25,000 in national tournaments and ₹50,000-1 lakh in international games.
Any reward money earned is an icing on the cake, but parents can’t rely on it to fund the expenses.
Vedant Panesar, a 21-year-old chess player from Mumbai, said that in any sport, to get better, players burn more money than they earn. Panesar has been playing chess since he was 10 years old but continues to focus on progressing in his game rather than chasing money. “I can easily earn ₹5-7 lakh monthly by just playing events and through coaching, but I will have to give up my ambition of becoming better at the game,” he said.
Panesar said India doesn’t host major chess championships, so international travel is inevitable. “Europe is the epicentre of chess. Every year, I play about 10 tournaments by making four trips. Each trip costs me at least ₹3-3.5 lakh if I travel alone and go without coaching,” he said.
He added that he picks events where he can play against better opponents to improve his rating, which means the chances of winning prize money are less. “I intentionally don’t play tournaments where I have a better chance of winning as I won’t get better by playing weaker players,” he added.
Panesar recently finished first in Group C of the annual chess tournament held in Wijk aan Zee, the Netherlands, which qualified him to play in Group B in 2026.
He also spends a substantial amount on coaching under grandmaster Krisztian Szabo, who charges ₹5,000 per hour. Panesar trains four to five hours a week.
The bill is on parents
Financial support in the form of grants and scholarships is typically available for senior athletes only after they are 17-18 years old. Until this happens, parents should be prepared to foot the expenses completely.
The Sports Authority of India (SAI) has programmes like Khelo India Talent, Olympic Podium Scheme, Olympic Gold Quest, etc., to provide financial aid to players. Stipends given under these schemes can help cover a large part of the travel costs.
However, the limitation of most of these schemes is that they are given to top-rung players. For instance, players in the Top 20 international rankings are eligible for government-aided coaching in badminton.
Ashok Kumar, vice-chancellor of the Sports University of Haryana, said the government support starts when the player has already started winning medals. “At present, most of the resources, both from the government and private grants, go to top players who are already star players. They have enough money to support themselves, so, the government funding should be diverted to budding players instead.”
The government should consider extending financial support at sub-junior (under 16) and junior levels (under 19) so that children are not forced to opt out due to financial constraints, said Kumar, who has served as the vice-president of the Badminton Association of India (BAI) for four years and the president of Uttarakhand State Badminton Association for 12 years. “Several years of continuous, unwavering support from a young age is required from the government to create Olympians.”
Kumar’s daughter, Kuhoo Garg, played for the Indian badminton national team for seven years. She trained at the Pullela Gopichand Badminton Academy and received ₹25,000 monthly stipend from ONGC Ltd.
Sports as a career
Typically, athletes play until the age of 30 in most sports—35 in cricket and football. Through the sports quota, national team players can get jobs in public sector undertakings (PSUs), banks, and other government institutions. However, such opportunities for second-rung players and below are scarce.
In cricket and football, earnings and progress are not primarily dependent on international tournaments, as domestic leagues alone give players ample opportunities to earn handsomely. Sayak Ghosh, chief executive and founder of sports performance analysis startup StepOut, said football players could play in the Indian Super League (ISL), I-league, the second division league of football, and also state leagues. However, earnings vary drastically.
“In the I-league, players can earn anywhere between ₹2.5 lakh and ₹25 lakh annually, ISL earnings range between ₹30 lakh and ₹3 crore, while state leagues are mostly contractual and players get paid in the range of ₹5,000 to ₹25,000 per month,” said Ghosh.
Players who make it to the ISL and I-league can create a sizable corpus for a stable future after retirement. In cricket, too, the Indian Premier League (IPL) and Ranji Trophy players stand to earn handsomely.
Gupta said the challenge in other sports is twofold: Domestic leagues don’t pay enough to secure a player’s long-term future, and job opportunities are scarce after retirement.
“Domestic leagues in table tennis are not as rewarding as cricket or football. Only seven to eight players in top leagues stand to earn ₹7-10 lakh annually,” he said. “As for jobs, only those who make it to the national team may get government jobs. However, state- and district-level players get limited job opportunities, mostly clerical positions with low salaries. Even opportunities in PSUs and banks have shrunk over the last few years. Not a single table tennis player has got a PSU job in the last three years, and these institutes now hire on contracts,” he said.
For this reason, most Indian parents still encourage their kids to also focus on studies to keep an alternative option open while aiming for a sports career.
“I strongly recommend having a backup career option or considering college, especially in the US, where student-athletes receive more support and have a lighter study load,” Meera said. “A sports career is financially risky—only the top 100 pro tennis players break even on their expenses. Everyone else spends more than they earn, accumulating financial losses. Of course, the rewards for reaching the top 10 are huge, which is what every player dreams of,” she added.
She said her daughter plans to settle in Australia if she pursues a tennis career, but will move back for a tech career as India has more opportunities on that front.
While Jain has left it to his son to choose his own career path, he periodically reminds him that studies need equal attention. “Till he turns 15, we will do as he wishes. However, after that, depending on how he is progressing, we will decide whether he can keep pursuing cricket or needs to focus on his studies.”
A sports career can also be unforgiving as one major injury can change the game. Having an alternative career option helps in such cases.
Garg decided to stop playing badminton professionally in 2021 following an ACL tear. She graduated from a tier-one college at Delhi University and cleared civil services in 2023 at her first attempt. “She had surgery in 2022, but with the long recovery period, she decided to prepare for civil services instead. Sports teach you resilience and perseverance, which helped her bounce back from the setback and charter a career in civil services,” said Garg’s father Kumar.
“She has started playing badminton again, but it’s secondary now,” he added.
