Tamannaah Bhatia to play sports coach in next

Actress Tamannaah Bhatia will be seen in the role of a coach in Sampath Nandis sports drama.

She will be playing the female protagonist as a sports coach to an all-girls team opposite Gopichand in the yet-to-be titled sports drama.

"I share a great working relationship with the director and when the story was narrated to me, I found the script very exciting and experimental. Sports is something that has always intrigued me. There will be a lot of groundwork that I will have to undergo right from accent to my posture to technical knowledge to prepare myself well for this film," Tamannaah said.

"My role is a tribute of sorts to coaches like Pullela Gopichand, Ramakant Achrekar, Guru Hanuman, Satpal Singh and the likes who have turned things around for Indian sports. Coaching is an underrated aspect of any professional sport and that is why this was even more interesting," she added.

The actress feels "the coaches tend to absorb much of the unwarranted blame, but they are still important figureheads, vital to their team's overall success".

"The best coaches in sports history have impacted the game both on and off the sidelines of their respective sports. There is one thing they all had in common though, a winner's mentality and that's something that I want to showcase on the big screen. I have been making a conscious effort of multi-tasking between genres so that there's more versatility in my creative kitty and I'm not stereotyped into any particular genre. Versatility is the key to survival," she added.

Talking about the project, Nandi said: "Tamannaah is one of the most contemporary and talented actresses of our times. Moreover this is a sports drama and the actress needs to be very physically active and I see Tamannaah has already started gearing up."

The entertainer, which is being produced by Chitturi Srinivas Rao under Srinivasaa Silver Screen banner, will go on floors in November.