sameerph wrote: ↑Mon Mar 20, 2023 2:30 pm
Almost no decent player trains in India these days. They have no faith in AITA and Indian coaches. So, those who can afford go to academies in Europe (mostly) and US. Those who cannot afford go to Thailand.
That is our real problem. At least a few of the guys with some backing and support manage to go abroad, but it is totally killing women's tennis. Indian parents won't easily send girls abroad even if they can afford a little bit of it or can work toward raising the funds. Most good Indian girl juniors are not able to make a move once they reach a top-150 level in the juniors at age 16 or 17, and they disappear. Year after year.
It is sad how AITA is utterly incompetent and have not done one thing for decades to set up proper academies and improve the coaching situation. They just do the very minimum needed to humor anybody who may potentially create trouble for them. Others who can raise a stink give up and don't even try. AITA is adept at the game of self-preservation with minimal effort. They are not interested in showing any results because they know that it is not needed for them to just keep the "family business" going. Actually they know that it is better to not create much noise by claiming results or having positive newspaper articles written on AITA. No news is the best. Doing nothing is easiest. They deliberately stay under the radar and keep their "congenial happy family" system going with low-level lower-tennis-quality people as coaches and national selectors (you see, that way they won't fight among themselves either, and would stay thankful and loyal to AITA and their "inactivity" principles!). Just list a few key high level people who are given board meeting lunches and take them out of the equation too.
It is a rotten system to the core. Somebody from the central government needs to get involved. Unfortunately, we never get a sports minister or anybody in Delhi who is a real tennis lover and wants to do something about it.
That is our real problem. At least a few of the guys with some backing and support manage to go abroad, but it is totally killing women's tennis. Indian parents won't easily send girls abroad even if they can afford a little bit of it or can work toward raising the funds. Most good Indian girl juniors are not able to make a move once they reach a top-150 level in the juniors at age 16 or 17, and they disappear. Year after year.
I think the US collegiate system is perhaps best for Indian girls as they have a coach and team structure and also travel together.
Downside is that girls reach the top levels at even earlier ages than boys, so starting pro tennis at 22 is even later for girls in terms of tennis development. Neutral factor is that some like Tara Iyer and Yuki's sister have found decent careers from their collegiate academics which is a loss from a tennis perspective but perhaps is a win from a personal development perspective.
Yes, overall there are few on womens side who have gone to college and made it big on WTA tour as compared to those on the mens side. As far as India is concerned, there is nobody. One who is having decent success right now is Rutuja Bhosale but her career high ranking is still outside top 300 as compared to that on mens side we have so many- Bhupathi, Somdev, Saketh, Jeevan etc, who went quite high in singles or at least went into top 100 in doubles.
So, from purely tennis perspective going to US college may not be right thing on womens side if one has to make it top 100 or even 200 on WTA tour.
There was Manisha Malhotra, who played Olympics doubles with Ankita, who went to US college too (Univ. of Tennesseee, iirc). Manisha became a big contributor to Indian sports later though, even if her tennis did not go much further. That is also important. US colleges can prepare you to be modern in your outlook (not just on tennis, but also on life and on the "business" that is sports) and become well-rounded individuals with confidence, which we can use in our sports fraternity if they return. Harsh is another case of that, though he didn't return.
Rutuja is the only one after Manisha from the women's side though, and we are yet to produce a top-200 player on the women's side who did US college tennis and returned. But except Tara, who was just brilliant in academics and other things too, I don't think college tennis made any of our players' tennis worse. I would still recommend college tennis for any of our female players. 2 or 3 years in the US and then turning pro at 20 or 21 is enough (no need to graduate right away with a 4 year degree).
jayakris wrote: ↑Tue Mar 21, 2023 6:23 pm
Rutuja is the only one after Manisha from the women's side though, and we are yet to produce a top-200 player on the women's side who did US college tennis and returned.
We have produced only 4 top 200 players in history on WTA circuit so far - Sania, Nirupama, Ankita and Karman. ( not counting Shikha and Sunitha who were brought up in US). So, we had little basic talent in women's tennis to get to even top 200 level . So, those who went to college probably did not have it too in first place .
If any of the above 4 would have benefitted from going to college - certainly not Sania. Other 3 maybe, not sure.
Not sure if any of the above four could have benefited from college. My guess is, probably not. They are/were all technically sound for the most part, and generally well-developed as all-round individuals too. I think there were others who probably could have benefited and we could have had a player or two more in the top-200 if they had actually done the homework and gone to some good college program early enough. Not thinking of anybody specific, but who knows what could have happened to those like Zeel, Pranjala, Riya, Sahaja, Vaidehi etc, had they gone to the US college circuit? The ones with good potential (and fewer limitations on height/size etc) never really went to US colleges, with the exception of Rutuja. So, there isn't much data to make a judgment one way or the other whether it could have helped or hurt.
jayakris wrote: ↑Thu Mar 16, 2023 6:06 pm
Krisha lost 57 36 to the 16th seed Taylor Goetz (USA,218). She has reached the doubles QF also, and has picked up enough points to move up about 70 spots to around #315 as the highest ranked Indian born in 2007 or later (Shruti, Suhita, Sonal and Madhurima ahead of her but they are older).
Krisha Mahendran did not have big results this week at the second Santo Domingo J200 in the Dominican Republic. She lost in the second round to Capucine Jauffret of USA, 57 46. The loss was a to a good player, it seems, as Capucine then upset the 9th seed also before falling to the top seed in three sets. Krisha has reached the double semifinal with Riley Crowder (USA). They were unseeded but upset the third seeded German-Polish pair today. Krisha will move a another 30+ spots up now in the ranking to #4 in the Indian junior list inside top-280. It has been a fast rise for her in the last couple of months. [Friday Update: Krisha and Crowder went down in an STB against the top seeds in the SF]
By the way, shouldn't we start a thread for Yuvan Nandal? Winning a J300 abroad qualifies, right? We have one for Manas and Yuvan now has better results. I don't want to break rules, though we probably don't have any rules for juniors' threads (which we have only made very very rarely). So I guess I will wait for PKB to do it, so we moderators can act like we just tolerated him breaking some nonexistent rules
There are some good details on his plans and coaching. Aditya Sachdeva is the coach given credit here. No mention of Stephen Koon in Nonthaburi, though we know that he has been a big part of Yuvan's development too. Aditya is a good coach. He brought up Yuki after all (but Yuki also was under Koon's watch for quite sometime).
What is surprising -- and a bit disappointing -- is that Yuvan Nandal, Aryan Shah et al don't play any pro tournaments. At 17, they should be doing that, preparing the transition to the pro circuit, by at least playing the home M15s and M25s. The level of competition is perforce more intense than in the juniors.
Manas Dhamne earned his thread by virtue of being the top-ranked 13- and 14-year-old in the world. His progress seems to have hit a roadblock, and he has had some setbacks over the past year in terms of improvements in tournament performance. I hope the Italians will iron things out soon.
PKBasu wrote: ↑Sat Mar 25, 2023 8:17 am
What is surprising -- and a bit disappointing -- is that Yuvan Nandal, Aryan Shah et al don't play any pro tournaments. At 17, they should be doing that, preparing the transition to the pro circuit, by at least playing the home M15s and M25s. The level of competition is perforce more intense than in the juniors.
Aryan Shah did play 4 pro tournaments last year where he qualified into couple of M15 tournament but lost in first match of the other 2. He was in the qualifying entry list this week at Mysuru M25 but is not in the qualifying draw, maybe he got a main draw wild card.
Yuvan has not played a single pro tournament so far though which is surprising considering he is close to 18 now.
Niru's 16 year old daughter Sahana Sanjeev (USA,605) is the 2nd seed at a W60 in Trinidad and has reached the SF there. She had an R1 bye, beat Onalee Wagner of Germany 63 61 and then beat the 5th seed Mia Garber (USA,717) 61 61 today in the QF. Dominating scorelines.
Have nobody else to follow this week on the junior circuit, as Manas went down in the R2 at the France J200, so I will look at the Indian-American
Sahana beat the higher ranked 3rd seed Kayla Brianne Moore (USA,558) 63 64 and reached the final at the Trinidad J60. Not big wins or anything and not a big event, but I like the scorelines and the fact that she justified her seeding. She plays a lady who shouldn't be playing this event, to start with - top seed 18 year old Catherine Walker (USA,354)... Update: She went down 16 26 in the final, which was sorta expected... But a good run there!
Krisha Mahendran (IND,290) and Aditya Govila (IND,250) are at the J200 in Woodbridge, on the outskirts of Toronto, CAN. Both play singles R1 there today.
