World Team Tennis: Leander Paes Dazzles

A packed Kastles Stadium at The Wharf watches the finals of the World Team Tennis on 28 July 2013, at Washington DC. In the deciding set, of mixed doubles, Andy Roddick and Alisa Kleybanova fight back from 2-4 down against Martina Hingis and Leander Paes, to tie breaker.

At the match point a forehand winner from Paes bags the World Team Tennis (WTT) Championship 2013 for his team Washington Kastles. Earlier he had won the men’s doubles as well. It was a hat trick victory for the Kastles. In fact they have won the title four times during the last five years. Leander was involved in all those victories. In2009 and 2011 he was chosen as the Most Valuable Player (MVP) of the entire WTT.

We in India are not familiar with the competitions and format of WTT which is very popular in the United States during summer months. Leading players from ATP and WTA take part. Both Serena Williams and Venus Williams have played for the Kastles.

The WTT was started in the early 1970s. There have been some changes in the format since then. Each match consists of one set each of men’s singles, men’s doubles, women’s singles, women’s doubles and mixed doubles. There are eight teams split into Eastern Conference and Western Conference. The winners in each play off for the title. A season involves 7 home matches and 7 away matches for every team.

In certain aspects, the rules differ from regular tennis. There is no ‘advantage’ for instance. If 40-40 is reached the side which gets the next point wins the game. The court consists of coloured segments. The idea originally was to have a distinctive identity and to avoid the white lines. But the lines are back as you can see in the photo below:

Barney Allis Plaza Team Tennis Court, Kansas City

Coming back to Leander - He is a highly respected and successful personality in WTT as he is in ATP and Davis Cup. India has honoured this winner of 13 Grand Slam titles with Arjuna Award, Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna Award and the Padma Sri.

Even at the age of 40, his playing capabilities have not diminished. He recently made a statement that if he knew he would stay on in competitive tennis for so long, he would have continued playing singles for some more years.

It was a sad day for his many fans when he decided to concentrate on doubles only. Like Ramesh Krishnan he had won the junior singles championships at Wimbledon and the US Open. He was ranked World No.1 among juniors. In the ATP he did not shine in singles as expected though he did reach the rank of 73.

But in Davis Cup it has been another story. Remarkable record in both singles and doubles. Debut in 1990. Victory-Defeat Record: Singles 48-22 Doubles 40-10. One of his most outstanding performances was in the World QF against the much superior France at Frejus in 1993. The 20 year old Leander won his second singles tie also to even up the match scores 2-2. Then, in a nail biting classic encounter another of India’s great tennis players, Ramesh Krishnan, beat R. Gilbert 2-6, 6-4, 4-6, 7-5, 6-4 to take India to the semi finals.

Leander Paes has always given priority to playing Davis Cup matches for India. His personal interests take a back seat on such occasions. In February 2013, he was presented with ITF’s Davis Cup Commitment Award.

Then there was the Olympic Singles Bronze Medal at Atlanta in 1996. Incidentally, Leander is the only tennis player and one of the very few sports persons to have participated in six Olympics. Will he make it to the next Games? Why not? He points out that Martina Navratilova was winning Grand Slams at the age of 50. One, I think, was with him as partner.

Leander has appeared in a Bollywood movie but that has not affected his focus on tennis. Acting is probably in his blood somewhere. On his mother’s side he is a direct descendant of Michael Madhusudan Dutt a great Bengali poet and dramatist of the 19 c.

Carry on, Leander. And come back from Rio with a Gold Medal before you hang up your boots.

■

Photos from Wikimedia Commons.

Related Posts:

 

Tennis: Mahesh Bhupathi bids farewell to Olympics

The Great Indian Tennis Mess

Tennis: Leander Paes, the Indian Hero

Tennis: Leander Paes, the Indian Hero

Leander Paes

It is difficult to say where Leander Adrian Paes would stand if one tries to rank all the top Indian tennis players in history. But one thing is certain – Indian tennis never had an icon like him. He is the hero.

Paes was born on June 17, 1973 to Vece Paes an Indian Hockey Olympian and Jennifer who had represented the country in basketball. World took note of him when he won the Wimbledon Boys Singles in 1990 and went on to become the world number one among boys. Next year he bagged the US Open boy’s crown as well.

Mere statistics would indicate that Paes didn’t really achieve all that the nation had hoped of him in men’s singles though in men’s doubles and mixed doubles he continues to be one of the world’s top players. A podium performance at the Atlanta Olympics, just one singles title, a few brilliant victories like the one over Pete Sampras in the 1998 Pilot Pen International, career best ATP singles rank of 73. But he was always the man to beat, a fighter who would not give up till the last bullet is expended.

It is a different story in the Davis Cup in which Leander rose to great heights. On several occasions he beat players ranked much higher than him to bring India victory. He ranks fifth among the 4500 or so players who have participated in the Davis Cup since its inception in the win – loss ratio.

It is not just that. It is the manner in which Leander Paes performed. He gave each match everything that he had and often pulled back from seemingly impossible situations. He drove himself and went that extra mile. On 32 occasions in 40 Davis Cup ties Paes played two singles, and doubles. And 16 times he won all the three matches, carrying India to the next round virtually single handed.

It is amazing how this man with comparatively limited tennis capabilities has transformed himself into a real champion. The leadership expert Saurabh N. Saklani wrote an article about Paes in Businessworld captioned ‘Lessons from Leander Paes’ He says, ‘The Indian tennis ace is a great example of someone finding success within individual limitations’. You can read the full article at

http://www.businessworld.in/content/view/654/705/

Being presented as a business model does not mean that Paes is a money manic. At an age where most players would conserve their energies for the professional circuit and earn more, Leander’s first priority continues to be playing for India. He has been doing that for nearly 18 years now.

When India takes on Uzbekistan at Delhi on the 8th, Paes is not likely to play because of the injury sustained during the Australian Open. But he will be there, as captain, to lead and inspire his players.

Good luck Leander, good luck India.

Ends.

Photo: Wikipedia Commons Public DomainAlso see: Ramanathan Krishnan: India’s Tennis Legend.

Ramanathan Krishnan: India’s Tennis Legend.

Today’s newspapers carry a report from Kula Lumpur stating that the renowned Indian tennis player Ramanathan Krishnan was awarded Lifetime Achievement Award by the Asian Sports Press Union. On reading it, my mind went back to a print media report on the Wimbledon Championships in 1956 – 51 years back.

Centre Court. First round match. The1954 champion, J. Drobny seeded 5 and the crowd’s idol was playing a 19 year old from India, R. Krishnan. The youngster had won the Wimbledon boys crown two years earlier, but nobody gave him a chance against the Czechoslovak-born veteran left-hander who was making his 13th appearance at the All England Championships.

Krishnan took the first set 6-1. Drobny the next at 6-4 to equalize but there was nothing more he could do. The Indian won the next two at 6-1, 6-4. It was the greatest moment in Indian tennis since Independence notwithstanding Dilip Bose’s Asian Championship triumph in 1949 and subsequent seeding (15) at Wimbledon.

In the pre-Independence era, India had done well in tennis. The 1920s saw a string of victories by the Indians, particularly in the Davis Cup. The top players at that time were M. Saleem, AH Fayzee and AA Fayzee (brothers), Cotah Ramaswamy and Krishna Prasad. They triumphed over players from France, Romania, Holland, Belgium. Spain, and Greece. M. Saleem also reached the singles semi-finals in the 1924 Paris Olympics. Then there was Ghouse Mohammed who reached the last eight at Wimbledon in 1939.

But Krishnan surpassed them all. He reached Wimbledon semi-finals in two successive years, was 4^th seeded there once, and was ranked No.3 in the world. He spearheaded India’s entry into the Davis Cup finals in 1966; we lost 4-1. The match that we won was doubles in which Krishnan and J Mukerjea beat Newcombe and Tony Roche the previous year’s Wimbledon Doubles Champions. Krishnan’s Davis Cup record is outstanding, winning 50 out of 69 matches in singles and 19 out of 29 in doubles.

A grateful nation honored the tennis ace with the Arjuna Award, Padma Shree, and Padma Bhusan. Salaam, Krishnan!

Ends.

Also see:

Tennis: Leander Paes, the Indian Hero

Hockey days in Bangalore