Nirupama Sanjeev thread.....

[crosscourtwinner]

NIru has entered the $10,000 event in Hefei, China. Qualifying rounds this weekend. (Mods: Please move/delete this post in case it's posted already in a different page).

Very interesting that Niru is travelling all the way to China to qualify for the main draw. Obviously the field in the US tournaments proved to be a bit too strong for her. But good to know that she is making a serious attempt at comeback. Apparently, she had entered the event in Thailand the same week before withdrawing to play in the ancient city of China.

[crosscourtwinner]

Niru has won the first round of qualifying in the $10K event at Hefei, China.

At $10,000 Hefei, China

[Q1] SANJEEV, Nirupama (IND) beat LIU, Chang (CHN) 61 61

Amazingly, there are two Chinese girls by that name, one 19 and another 17. Don't know whom she beat

Next,

[Q2] SANJEEV, Nirupama (IND) vs. WANG, Boyan (CHN)

[crosscourtwinner]

Niru has entered the main draw.

At the $10,000 Hefei, China

[Q2] SANJEEV, Nirupama (IND) def. WANG, Boyan (CHN) 76(1) 64
[Q3] SANJEEV, Nirupama (IND) def. JI, Xin (CHN) 60 61

[crosscourtwinner]

Niru lost in the first round.

At the $10,000 Hefei, China
R1: (Q) SANJEEV, Nirupama (IND) l. (7) WANG, Qiang (CHN) 6-3 7-5

The scorelines suggests she played the second set better, but maybe still has some way to go in terms of matching the fitness of an 18-year-old. Next, she plays the $25,000 qualies at Fuzhou, China

[crosscourtwinner]

Niru had an indifferent outing at Fuzhou. She had a bye in the first round of qualifying but crashed out in the second round. Can't make out much from the scoreline except that it must have been a "blow hot blow cold" performance.

At the $25,000 Fuzhou, China
Q2: SANJEEV, Nirupama (IND) l. HOU, Ziqi (CHN) 6-4 0-6 6-3

-

[bujilover]

Its now officially declared that Niru gonna play the CWG 2010 along with Sania and others.

Hope she makes use of this golden chance and excel..

[bujilover]

Niru had a grt outing in redding challenger tis week.

she qualified for md and lost in round one also she is in quarters of doubles upsetting 3rd seeds.

she gets one wta pt in singles ,so after the pt is added to computer,she will be ranked.

[sameerph]

Nirupama has come out with a book titled “The Moonballer’’.


NEW DELHI, August 3, 2013 Nirupama announces launch of her book


In another article she hits out at AITA for refusing her help for training.

AITA refused to take my help: former national tennis champ Nirupama Vaidyanathan

Interesting title to the book. I have never seen her play. Was she the moonballer type of player ?

[gbelday]

I am not sure if that was her style. I did see her play in the US Open qualifiers (don't remember the exact year but it was around 1999/2000). Jay's old notes should have my match report From what I remember, she had pretty decent ground strokes but her court coverage was below average. She was also a bit out of shape (maybe because it was towards the end of her career). I had a very brief chat with her then and I recall that she was about to start a yoga regimen. But she is a pioneer nevertheless and I have huge respect for her.

[jayakris]

Oh no, Niru was not at all a moonballer. She was a modern style player all through. She was about 5-7 or so; so not hampered by height probleems to have to moon ball. When she was in shape, for a few years, she was pretty damn good. Really solid ground strokes, though not always as deadly accurate to the lines like Sania was. Not a weak serve, but just as with most of our players, it was not a weapon or anything. As Gautam said, she was not great in movements, but was perhaps a bit quicker than Sania on that count. Due to being a 100 percent vegetarian, it was always tough for her to stick to diets and be in top physical shape always. Other than at the fag end of her career when shoulder injuries made it even worse, she was not that out of shape either though. She truly blazed her own trail, all alone. Not a soul to help her, but at age 18 and 19 she was in Europe (and winning double crown in the Monchangladbach challenger at age 19 to reach a #130 ranking in the world) - traveling with a mini rice cooker and cooking food for herself. Quite an amazing person in many ways, and she was absolutely a no-nonsense type in how she went about her business. Classy.

If anybody in Indian tennis can claim to have done things properly, always staying above the frey, and take AITA or anybody else to task for what all they have done wrong, it is Niru.

Jay

[sameerph]

Thanks, Gautam & Jay for that info.

I found another article where she explains the reason for the title of her book-

Interview: “Indian tennis has a lot of untapped potential” – former national tennis champ Nirupama Vaidyanathan

Your book is named ‘The Moonballer’. What is the reason behind it and does it reflect on your playing style?

It is to signify modest beginnings. I started playing tennis as a five-year-old and moonballed a lot (hit high balls). But when I played pro tennis, I was an all-court player, who relished coming to the net.

The name is to let young kids of today understand that you can start modestly but can achieve great things in life. The key is to keep at it.

Yes, she is really the trailblazer for womens tennis in India being the first Indian women to play & win a match in a grand slam. I think she still remain the second best Indian player produced by India after Sania.

[jayakris]

Bit it is a catchy title indeed. Like one of my favorite titles from one of the guys whom I hated so much. "Bootlegger's Boy", the title of the autobiography of a real-life lowlife who was honest for once on that matter - by Barry Switzer (National-championship winning coach of U.Oklahoma and later the super-bowl winning coach of the Dallas Cowboys). In Barry's case, the title fit. In Niru's case, it doesn't, but it is a good title nonetheless! Jay

[VReddy]

Nirupama Sanjeev's interview on YouTube

Watch the specific part where it opens, you will all be in for a pleasant surprise.

Big props to Dhruv, BSharma, PKB, Jay, Sameer, Jaydeep, Rajiv and several of forum members who have gone way beyond than just fans, to try to make a difference in our own way. As Mukund mentioned in one of his recent interviews, some of the followers are way more qualified than the players themselves at times in their respective fields - so it speaks volumes of the passion and the big heart to put in effort to fix things while never expecting anything in return (and even intentionally staying away from attention/limelight).

Just thought I'd share that wonderful snippet from Nirupama Sanjeev on Jay and TennisIndia.org/Sports-India.com

[prasen9]

You young guys do not even know what a life-saver it was. I was a sports junkie as a kid and participated in sports quizzes and so on. My brother and I used to race when the newspaper came and we would turn it over to the last page and fight over who would get it. Then, when I came to this country, no news at all. Then, Jay started his website and we would get all the information from there. But, there was no forum to discuss. I did it via email with Jay! I am very grateful for the service he provided before this website was set up and even now single-handedly doing the bulk of the work with some aid with respect to coronavirus. Sometimes I think Jay missed his real calling. He is, no doubt, a fabulous professor and it perhaps pays more and provides stability. But, he would have been an award-winning journalist. As Niru said, I had no idea how he got the results. He would call the tournament office (at that time, cellphones were perhaps not that rampant). At times, he would perhaps get the phone number of the tournament office from some ATP or ITF office. And, then perhaps the tournament office gave Niru's number or whatever. He was relentless. I am forever grateful to the great Jay.

[Rajiv]

Jay has been a torch bearer of this initiative and I just cannot imagine how would life be without this Forum.

Prior to forum , I had to rely on making calls to the Sports Department of local Newspapers to find out the results , but that information would be only restricted to results of big tournaments , but how to find out about guys like say , Syed Fazaluddin in Thailand or Pralhad Srinath semis run at the Philippines futures in 1999, and for that I relied on a good friend of mine the Hong Kong ATP supervisor Ed Haridisty to provide me the results through his contacts about the progress of our guys.

All of this changed when Jay took over , and when we didn’t have the forum , e mails were exchanged and one subject which was heavily discussed was , why wasn’t LP playing singles for DC when he still had him in him to make the difference.

Also chat session’s during the DC tie or any important match figuring our guys were truly unforgettable, and one which stands out was Sunil Kumar at Junior Wimbledon and had high hopes on Sunil Kumar bagging the Junior Wimbledon crown as he replicated RK as the youngest National Champion , and like RK were hoping he too would bag the Junior crown , , there were only 2 ( Jay & Myself) of us in the chat room during SK’s third round encounter and feeding each other the scores point by point ,But SK got broken in the 9th game of the deciding 3rd set to loose the match(after saving Mp”s) and both of us signed off with one word “He Lost”