As I woke up to a plethora of Facebook posts this morning celebrating India’s success at the Wimbledon, I could not help but think that the summer of 2015 will no doubt be written in gold in India’s sporting history. It was not just a summer that saw Indian tennis stars wow the sacred grounds of Wimbledon but also a reinstatement of the fact that perhaps Indian Tennis is in many ways finally gaining a position of international reckoning.
With veteran player Leander Paes clinching his 16th Grand slam, the mixed doubles of the Wimbledon with Martina Hingis, it was a hatrick for India. The 17-year old Sumit Nagal bagged the boys doubles title while Sania and Martina Hingis had bagged the Women’s doubles at the Wimbledon earlier. Yes indeed Leander Paes, Sania Mirza and Sumit Nagal did India proud and completely justify the celebration that followed their victory and tremendous achievement.
However I cannot help but wonder what next. Would these individual achievements serve to boost the kind of training facilities available for aspiring tennis players? Would parents now start naming their kids Sumit and Sania more often than Sachin and Sourov? Though I never want to belittle the kind of demi god status that is given to our cricket players or the kind of glory that cricket has brought to our country, the disparity in training facilities for other sports apart from cricket is at times worrying.
Though I must mention that Tennis if seen individually has made significant improvement in the past few years, there are strict training regiments and teaching modules, it surely needs a lot more to be done.
The current spree of winning was India’s most significant achievement since the days of Vijay Amritraj’s quarter final appearance in 1973. Do we again have to wait that long for an encore?
Leave a reply