Domination in every sense: Why Maharashtra is ruling India’s junior tennis scene

Indian tennis has traditionally enjoyed a fair bit of success at the junior level. We have had junior Grand Slam champions in the past and even a junior world No 1. But these performances have been sporadic and rarely translated to the senior level. One of the many reasons behind this has been the largely individualised training at the grassroots level and touring on the pro circuit.

However, recent results suggest that this could be changing soon. The 2018 Nationals saw Maharashtra emerge as a dominant force in junior tennis.

Maharashtra players finished either winners or runners up in 11 out of 16 events at the Nationals in 2018 and are ranked No 1 in India in five junior categories as of November.

This success has not been achieved overnight but the fruits of an almost decade-long structured programme. Here, the state support is not just about sponsorship or monetary bonuses and reimbursements for tournament and training travel; the Maharashtra State Lawn Tennis Association’s involvement goes beyond that to specialised training and unique initiatives.

The state of Maharashtra has been at the forefront of Indian tennis for the last couple of years when it comes to tournaments. In the last one year, the state has hosted a WTA (Mumbai Open) as well as an ATP (Maharashtra Open) event – the first association in India to do so in the same season as well as the longest running ATP Challenger.

However, it is not more than just this external infrastructure that sets Maharashtra tennis apart, it their long-term grassroots planning and investment. MSLTA’s developmental system at the junior level is something that has shown consistent results at the national level on the junior circuit.

Maharashtra has always had players in the list of Nationals and national ranking tournament finalists, but never to this extent. A look at the Nationals winners for the last five years in the All India Tennis Association database suggests an increase in the number of Maharashtra players in the junior National finals.

In 2013, Maharashtra had a winner (Mihika Yadav) and a runner-up (Snehal Mane) in Under-14 girl category, while Arjun Kade was the men’s runner-up. In 2014, Mihika Yadav defended her title, while Siddhant Banthia was the runner-up in the boys category.

But it was in 2015 that a real change was seen: Malikaa Marathe, Aryan Goveas, and Salsa Aher, all of whom would go on to become regular names on the junior circuit, as well as Sanya Singh and Vikrant Mehta, were among the final two in various junior categories at the Nationals.

The only other state that comes close in terms of finalists is Tamil Nadu, whose robust program is bearing fruit now with a majority of the top Indian men’s players coming from the state – Prajnesh Gunneswaran, Ramkumar Ramanathan, Jeevan Neduncherhiyan, Vijay Sundar Prashanth, Mukund Sasikumar, and Sriram Balaji to name a few.

Vision 2020

The MSLTA’s plan to create a similarly strong structure for junior players to train and transition to seniors is called Vision 2020.

“We started this program about eight to nine years back and there has been structured growth in it,” said Sunder Iyer, secretary of MSLTA.

“Last year we had five to six players in our mission program, this year we have 20. To be part of this program, a player has to be ranked in India and ranked in the state among other things.

“It has an elite player pyramid programme with categories right from the Under-10 level for children to the elite group of seniors – starting from the bottom and then going to the top.

“Many times, organisations can be guilty of doing it the other way round, supporting only the top players.

Tennis is an individual sport and most players have to go pro – manage their careers without external finances. But Maharashtra is making its players work like a team, in order to give them a better background.

The programme works with and monitors the progress of the players without disturbing their existing dynamics of play and coaches.

“We are doing camps for them, sending travelling coaches,” said Iyer. “For example, at the Nationals in Delhi we had three travelling coaches and MSLTA was paying for them.

“Every Nationals we send a coach; the coach is not attached to any player but the state. They go there, watch the players, explain to them what to do in the next match, get them to warm up and cool down as a team. So these small changes in the entire structure that are making a difference,” he added.

Human resource

The association also sends its junior players for camps internationally in the presence of the coaches from the programme. In the past, players from the state such as Rutuja Bhosale, Arjun Kadhe, and Aryan Goveas have been sent to the Tennis Val Academy in Spain, where the likes David Ferrer, Dinara Safina and Marat Safin have trained.

Another very interesting aspect of the program is how MSLTA has integrated the human resources available, by making all coaches part of it.

“We have included all coaches in Maharashtra to be part of this programme,” said Iyer. “Even if they are not from the association, everybody feels they are a part of the programme.

“Nandan [Bal], Hemant [Bendrey], Kedar Shah, Aditya Madkekar, Radhika [Tulpule-Kanitkar]… all the players who have been coaching and have produced players are all a part of the programme. They do camps for the players.

“So ultimately the inputs are not coming from just one coach. If there is one coach who has gone for the Nationals, he then writes a report about you and sends it to your coach. He doesn’t change it there.

In any sport, a coach looks at a player from one angle or perspective. This way there are value-additions that are circulated to all coaches and it really helps the student,” Iyer explained.

Decentralisation

An important aspect of this is decentralisation of the sport. Gone are the days when tennis was considered a sport for the rich with access only in urban areas. Gone are the days when Mumbai and Pune were the main centres of tennis in the state; MSLTA is taking the sport to the other districts.

In the year 2016-’17, 40 out of 111 players in the Vision 2020 programme were from other districts. The association also holds tournaments in these places, from Solapaur to Aurangabad.

The results of this programme are there for all to see. Banthia and Yadav became Asian junior champions, while Sharannya Gaware is the India No 1 in both Under-16 and Under-18 category, and Aher made it to the Indian team for the WTA Future Stars event at Singapore in 2017.

Currently, Maharashtra has one man and two women in the seniors’ top 10 in singles, as well as two men and three women, including the top-ranked Prarthna Thombare, in doubles. But it in the next crop, the age-group players, who Maharashtra have focused on, it might prove to a huge game-changer in the coming years as they become seniors and make their way to the pro circuit.