As she awaits confirmation of her place in the British Olympic team Kirsty Gilmour has admitted to drawing heavily on the inspiration offered by fellow racquet-wielding Scot Andy Murray.
The 22-year-old badminton player has been clear at the top of the British women’s singles rankings for the past four years and has made her own fair share of sporting history during that period, but as she anticipates heading to the biggest competition of all she is particularly thrilled by the prospect of being a teammate of the man who grew up 30 miles across central Scotland.
“If I get to Rio I’m going to struggle to keep my cool around Andy Murray,” said Gilmour whose inclusion in the British badminton team should a formality when it is named on Monday.
“I think he’s just, like, sport… He’s what a sportsman should be. He’s just good, solid, honest, doesn’t pretend to be anything he’s not and he’s just all about his sport and his family. A good role model. He’s definitely someone I would be pretty excited about being in the same team as.”
With her own profile growing, particularly in Asia, those comments are placed in perspective by Gilmour’s feelings about rubbing shoulders with the many other well-known faces who will be in Rio.
“It breaks that ‘Oh my God wow’ factor when you’re also an athlete because I do the same things as them every day,” she rightly observed.
Gilmour gave herself a huge pre-Olympic boost when her performance at this month’s Indonesian took her to 15th in the world, improving on her own previous Scottish all-time best set two years ago and she is currently 76 places higher than the leading English player Fontaine Mica Chapman, while among British contenders for places in the team only Raj Ouseph, (14th in men’s singles) and his English compatriots Chris and Gabby Adcock (seventh in mixed doubles) are higher ranked.
As was the case two years ago when she made steady progress in the world rankings ahead of making history by becoming the first Scot ever to contest a Commonwealth Games singles final, Gilmour has recovered to her current position after dropping to 35th place in the intervening year.
As well as that performance in reaching the last 16 at the world superseries premier event in Jakarta she also reinforced her status closer to home by living up to her seeding to become the first Scot ever to contest a singles final at the European Championships where she was beaten in the final by world number one Carolina Marin, her friend and rival.
Whereas the Spaniard has taken the sport by storm, winning back to back world titles over the last two years, Gilmour believes her career is following a more traditional trajectory for a European player as she steadily builds both knowledge and confidence ahead of what would be a first Olympic appearance but, she hopes, will not be her last.
In that regard she again draws inspiration from Murray and the way he has developed his game, not least because she can so readily identify with his background.
“He just proves that even when he was striving towards it in his early twenties it was possible if you just keep chipping away at it then it will come and that maturity will solidify in your game in your mid or late twenties,” said Gimour.
“It is a process. It’s not just going to happen overnight and to prove that a Scottish person from a little town can have that mentality and be up there through sheer will and determination over anything else is a huge inspiration.
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