What ails Indian tennis? Nearly nobody in top-300s

[jayakris]

[Starting a thread to move discussions from various threads, as it looks like Karman Thandi will be the only top-300 player on the mens' or womens' side from India at the end of 2022. Moving other posts here. Mod, Jay]

Let me post this article from early October last year in The Hindu, when we no longer had anybody in the top 150. The decline of Indian tennis from pre-eminence to its lowest ebb

Most of what is said there is all of course still applicable, just more desperately so - as we will soon have nobody even in the top-300. (A month after that article RamK won the middle east challenger for 80 points and made us feel better; but that was a flash in the pan or a fleeting chimera, as we found out this year)

I had missed this article last year, but this one quote from Zeeshan Ali catches my eye, as it has been something I have wanted to write about for a long time.

“We don’t have enough coaches, who can frame the kids’ games once they get out of under-12s and under-14s,” says Zeeshan. “I have been coaching for close to 24 years in the United States and Europe. It took me five to six years to learn how to coach. There aren’t enough coaches out on the court. There are a lot of people promoting the game…former players, administrators. But too few on the court.”

That was a KEY observation. No good former player with any level of pro tour experience is really getting on court and actually coaching a player match after match. Is Zeeshan from 3 decades ago the last good Indian player to take coaching seriously?

Leander, Mahesh, Srinath, Fazal, Prakash, Stephen, Harsh, Sunil, Sania, Niru, Manisha, Bops. The list goes on... NOBODY is moulding any Indian player on court and teaching them the finer details of on-court mechanics and strategy. (Maybe Niru does some, in the US?) Guys like Mahesh have done great in the organizational part. But what about actual coaching?

The holes I see in Indian players' game are so big that elephants can run through them. When I see even the current top players, the holes in on-court strategy and technical flaws are so visible. Just watch Mukund's match yesterday. Indians are all pretty good or at least decent these days in their ground strokes, and power/accuracy. Their skill level is terrible and ability to vary their shots - change speed or spin or bounce, hit a drop or stick a volley. Nobody is good at any of that. The adjustments needed to take their games from top-600 to top-300 and then to top-150 are not coached by anybody - and that is very clear. I am sure some of the former players give verbal advice and all. Not enough. Be with the player for long-enough periods and teach techniques and strategy over many matches and training sessions. That is not happening at all for Indians.

Actually there is one good player from the last 30 years who actually does serious on court coaching. Karan Rastogi, top-300 more than a decade ago (also world junior #4, India #1 etc in 2003) whose injuries sadly took him out of the tour. But we lost him to Hong Kong. I think he has helped Hong Kong take a next step too. But where is that real "guru" with even decent pro tour experience in India? I mean, our junior Davis Cup team is coached by a guy who, while apparently is a decent coach, has one pro tour win and one junior tour win in his record! That says it all for me.

[prasen9]

We had the academy such as BAT. Do we have any now? BAT used to get good coaches (or maybe then I thought they were good).

[jayakris]

^^^ 35+ years ago, Prasen, when LP was at BAT. They had Dave O'Meara, and he is the one who coached LP into what he was. That was that. They didn't produce anything after Dave left.

We have had some AITA national coaching center or whatever in a Gurugram farm, which is part of the "family business" that AITA was and sorta still is. Nothing has come out of that. Nobody has been coached to the top level by anybody in India. Maybe coach Sachdeva in Chandigarh who coached Yuki and now coaches Karman. But none of our upcoming players gets moulded by anybody with extensive playing experience on the tour, as far as I know. They need to go abroad, fairly late at age 15 to 17 to somewhere in Europe if they have money and the Europeans do some little work to improve them. That's it. Not enough.

[sameerph]

That is very good point, Jay. I had remarked earlier that AITA Or some of the acadamies need to get Karan back.

But did we have such quality coaches earlier ? Don't think so. Maybe we got plain lucky that we got 5 guys in last 5-8 years, Yuki, Prajnesh, Saketh, Sumit and RamK who all went to top 150 although for a short period of time. None of them were coached in their early years by someone with long played ng experience at higher level. Maybe if they had that they would have gone even higher and for a longer period of time.

[Rajiv]

Dave O'Meara was the head coach at BAT, but was in and out, the guy who was constantly with LP and rest of the boys was Thayagarajan Chandrsekaran .
In fact before Ram took off to Spain, his initial development was nutured and honed by T Chandra , and so did the boys from the TN stable Prajnesh, Jeevan etc were involved with Chandra in the beginning of their career.

[Atithee]

Isn’t Sania running an academy? All these players establish an academy pronto. What do they produce? I mean if Sania can’t produce any, what would AITA do that she can’t?

[jayakris]

Running an academy with other coaches using your name is not what we need. Being there and actively coaching a player. On court. None of the former players since Zeeshan Ali is really doing that seriously, as far as I know.

[jayakris]

But did we have such quality coaches earlier ? Don't think so. Maybe we got plain lucky that we got 5 guys in last 5-8 years, Yuki, Prajnesh, Saketh, Sumit and RamK who all went to top 150 although for a short period of time. None of them were coached in their early years by someone with long played ng experience at higher level. Maybe if they had that they would have gone even higher and for a longer period of time.

The last item you said is the truth. I am very much convinced that they would all have been better players (and become so earlier too), had they got the right advice from tour players. Not the "passing advice" which I am sure they have got from our former players. Those like LP, MB, Somdev, Manisha, Niru etc have definitely been good passing advisors and cheer-leaders to them. They have given them morale boost and help too, but that is not the issue.

What I am talking about is somebody sitting down with the tapes of their matches and dissecting it. On point progression, on-court strategies, and the "edge" items that win them those extra 5 points a match which makes the real difference. Things like "you should not have hit that flat shot there; just hit a high-looper to buy time", or "Why didn't you lob there?", or "Roll that forehand volley, and not drop it thinking the other guy won't reach it", "why are you hitting to his backhand 4 times in a row?", "why didn't you go to the towel there to break the momentum?", "just go tell the ump to watch for a foot fault on the opponent (even if that is not there!)" etc. And then go out on court and even demonstrate something if needed. That is hands-on coaching. Does any of our former players do this for somebody they are moulding? I doubt it.

When we see these foreign players at age 20 to 24, you can see how well-trained they are on some of these strategic items. Our players look dumb. Our players have the tools, and hit the basic "bread-and-butter" shots (groundies, shots on the rise, serves, deep shots, inside out forehand, backhand down the line etc) very well. Often better than their opponents. But anything off-schedule is very iffy with all of them.

There was a time when Indians were not athletic or strong or powerful in the "bread-and-butter" game, but were great at creative and off-schedule tennis. These days it is the reverse. Many are quite good at the base stuff, but are fish-out-of-water in bringing variations in their game, and even more so in handling variations thrown at them by others.

I invite everybody to count the next 25 drop shot attempts and the success rate by foreign players against our top players and our players' success rate (in competitive matches against players in similar ranking rage). Across the top 8 or so men/women players we get to watch every now and then, you will find that the success rate is probably 20% if even that, and at least 60% by the opponents. Most foreign players from USA, Europe, Korea, Japan, Australia, Brazil, Argentina, etc, can all drop the ball to the right spots, and more importantly they know when to do it. They do it with conviction. Our players may even have the technical ability to do it, but they invariably select the wrong times to hit it and then botch it up.

Some of these things are what is learned on the tour during matches at the right level. Our players learn it so slowly and they are old by the time they become good at it (and the base game starts deteriorating). Those who learned the tricks of the trade and know the situational importance of many such items in tennis, need to pass it on to the youngsters at the right age. That does not happen in India, because our coaching fraternity, by and large, are technicians of the base game and not strategists on the real game on the tour. Many Indian coaches are very good at what they do, but we need more than what they do.

Unfortunately, our successful players are all celebrities and have other successful things to do in their lives (can't blame them) once they retire. Coaching and mentoring a player on a daily basis, isn't that attractive to them.

[jayakris]

Dave O'Meara was the head coach at BAT, but was in and out, the guy who was constantly with LP and rest of the boys was Thayagarajan Chandrsekaran . In fact before Ram took off to Spain, his initial development was nutured and honed by T Chandra , and so did the boys from the TN stable Prajnesh, Jeevan etc were involved with Chandra in the beginning of their career.

You are absolutely correct, from what I have heard. Dave O'Meara was actually more of a spiritual and strategic guru for LP, if I am not mistaken. Those like T Chadrasekaran were the great on-court coaches. But like I was saying above, I think we may still have some very good coaches for the early technical development. It is the latter development that one gets from the tour match-experience that is missing. Our players need to learn it the hard way themselves (and some never learn too).

[Atithee]

Unfortunately, our successful players are all celebrities and have other successful things to do in their lives (can't blame them) once they retire. Coaching and mentoring a player on a daily basis, isn't that attractive to them.

The real unfortunate thing is that the players consider themselves celebrities long before retiring, even when they should be absorbing all the advice. This is one reason why good coaches don’t last with Indian setup. Indian coaches have it even worse in terms of indiscipline and sassiness. All conjecture on my part, but I think it is likely the case.

[Omkara]

Whoever coached LP and RamK were horrible.

[prasen9]

Whoever coached LP and RamK were horrible.

To a point, this is true. However, I am not so sure as you are. Sometime, people with unorthodox techniques have a difficult time fixing it and at some point, cannot really fix things. Trying to fix things actually results in worse results. Steve Smith's batting stance and Bumrah's runup are diabolical. Bumrah's will posibly result in injuries to him. But, I'd not change these because they possibly will lose their effectiveness. I am sure their coaches at some point told them these. And, in some cases, we see people with remodelled actions and stances, etc. not being that successful and going back to their original non-conventional, on-paper-suboptimal motions.

I am sure their first coaches were horrible. Early on, when players are very young, you can fix technical issues much easily. However, the BAT folks possibly got an LP and whoever coached RK in Spain, etc. perhaps got players who were freaks in some aspects, bad technique in others, but figuring out a way to win nonetheless to a certain level. Maybe they tried to fix things and went back. Or maybe they were oblivious to their technical issues and did not try it. At least in my mind, the culpability of the coaches who came later on is not so obvious.

[Omkara]

LP under Bob excelled. He brought in interesting changes w/o hurting his core skill. But he came late. It made sense to shift to doubles. Bob came post 1998 Atlanta games. By 2001 LP was mostly into doubles and by 2003 completely into doubles. Because of Bob Paes had a much better forehand, much better serve, but his backhand remained weak. Bob should be complemented for LPs doubles success. He became a better tennis player because of him.

So we lacked competent coaches. Still do.

I get your point on Steve and Bumrah. These are difficult calls to make. To change or not to change. But RamK and LPs weaknesses were basic, fundamental. Despite odd style of play, both Bumrah and Steve have done well. RamK and LPs basic game was never meant to take them higher. RamK stagnated after initial success. Between 1994-98 LP mostly was hovering between 100-150.

I am still lenient with LPs early coach as the game underwent drastic change during those days. Tough for them to asses that. What were RamK's coaches doing?

[prasen9]

I agree with the above post fully. My point was the latter coaches were brought in too late and thus had limited time and bandwidth to fix things. Anyway, it is what it is. The onus is on the federation to improve the infrastructure (including coaches) and they will do diddly squat. So, we are where we are and will remain there. Some random genius like Sania will emerge once in 30-50 years and the rest will be mediocre.

[Omkara]

I agree with the above post fully. My point was the latter coaches were brought in too late and thus had limited time and bandwidth to fix things. Anyway, it is what it is. The onus is on the federation to improve the infrastructure (including coaches) and they will do diddly squat. So, we are where we are and will remain there. Some random genius like Sania will emerge once in 30-50 years and the rest will be mediocre.

Such an irony. A player like Sania couldn't convince the country that we need to invest in the game, infra and its players.