Bickering, stagnation as Indian tennis battles for relevance

The All India Tennis Association (AITA) and the players being at loggerheads was not a new development. But the striking part was the lack of transparency in decision-making and nearly non-existent effort to address the concerns of the players.

Result was that the game plunged to new depths.

AITA President Anil Jain, who was accused of using his position for personal gains, avoided facing a no-confidence motion from the state associations only after he agreed to step aside.

Towards the end of a forgettable year, a new team of administrators won the elections, promising to change Indian tennis but a writ petition filed by two former players did not allow their declared reform process to begin.

There were accusations that the elections were held in violation of the Sports Code. The matter will not be heard before March 25, putting on hold the much-needed revamp of the system.

In a nutshell, everything that could have gone wrong, went wrong for Indian tennis in 2024.

Yuki Bhambri refused to play for India in a Davis Cup tie against Sweden in September without communicating any reasons.

But it was made clear by federation sources that his withdrawal was in response to being left out of the Paris Olympics where Rohan Bopanna, being a top-10 player, preferred N Sriram Balaji as his doubles partner.

The same Bhambri had travelled to Islamabad, Pakistan despite security concerns for a Davis Cup engagement in January-February an with some counselling from the administrators, he might have been able to let go of his misgivings.

But the AITA could not give a convincing reply to Bhambri either on why his name was not sent for inclusion in Target Olympic Podium Scheme or the role Bopanna had in making decision for Paris.

While Bhambri was disillusioned, India’s top singles player Sumit Nagal’s decision to pull out of ties against both Pakistan and Sweden was a bit baffling.

Captain Rohit Rajpal had even agreed to Nagal’s demand for a remuneration amount of USD 50,000 for annual Davis Cup duty but the Jhajjar player cited a back strain to pull out of the Sweden tie and also withdrew from an ATP Tour event the following week.

AITA went public with Nagal’s demands for money after India were thrashed 0-4 by a beatable Sweden. This once again triggered a war of words between AITA and Nagal.

Amid this drama, Sasikumar Mukund, the second-best singles player in India, was not even picked for the tie because a ban was imposed on him for his earlier refusal to travel to Pakistan owing to security fears and other disciplinary violations.

All these issues should have been handled in a better way.

On court, India did not enjoy much success. The 44-year-old Bopanna won the Australian Open men’s doubles title with Matthew Ebden, the high point of a productive partnership that drew to a close in November. But singles success was very limited.

After a decent first half in which Nagal touched a career-high rank of 68, he began to fizzle out in the second half of the season.

Such was his struggle that in his last 12 tournaments, Nagal has managed to win only two matches — one at Kitzbuhel Challenger in July and one at Basel in October.

Placed 98, Nagal is now on the brink of dropping out of top-100 and the next best is Mukund, ranked 368 at this point.

The next line of players — Manas Dhamne, Karan Singh, Dev Javia and Aryan Shah — don’t seem to have the support needed to become world-beaters. As for women’s circuit, no player looks promising enough to be touted as the next big thing.

Given the crisis of talent, India needs a robust domestic circuit and a chain of ATP Challengers and WTA/ITF women’s events. PTI AT PM PM