India’s tennis pairing of Leander Paes and Rohan Bopanna “were not prepared at all” for their matches at the recently-concluded Rio Olympic Games, Paes’ former doubles partner Mahesh Bhupathi said on Monday. Bhupathi said that the men’s doubles team did not even play any tournaments together to prepare for the Summer Games, which led to them losing their first round match against Poland’s Lukasz Kubot and Marcin Matkowski.

Bhupathi also blamed the duo’s poor performance on Paes reaching Rio only 36 hours before India’s match, according to PTI. “We could not expect anything from them and the results told,” he said, adding that India’s “best bet” for a medal had been the mixed doubles pairing of Bopanna and Sania Mirza, who lost both their semi-final and bronze medal matches. He further said that “everyone”, including Bopanna and the All India Tennis Federation, were to blame for Paes choosing not to give more time to practice for the Rio Games.

It was a “disappointing” feeling that India had not won any Olympic medals and that “players [a] lot less unaccomplished” than him and his former doubles partner had won them, the former doubles champion noted. “You got to be in it to win it and it didn’t happen for us,” he said. Between Bhupathi, Paes, Mirza and Bopanna, Indians in competitive tennis have won 36 doubles Grand Slams in both the men’s and mixed categories.