“Let’s play best of seven sets. And if I still lose, I’m not going to let you go home until I win.” The score was 6-1 5-7 and 5-2 in the third, I was leading obviously, when Azar sir went, “I was just warming up till now, I feel I’m completely ready now, let’s see if you can keep up with your game.” I was like, okay let’s do this, I’m always ready. We can do this all day long if you want. I’m not even hungry yet (we were playing since 8 in the morning and it was already 11 am by this point) but let’s take a little break after this one and we’re ready to go again. Alright, he said and then we played till almost 2.30 in the afternoon. We even lost the count of the score midway, but we played around seven sets. What’s even fun was after completing the final one, he went like, “there’s something wrong with my forehand today, do you mind if we practice a few cross-court rallies and then go home?” again, how can I say no to that, there’s nothing like enough playing time, I always want more and then some.

How it started?

I always used to watch whatever games they would televise. I remember my dad and grandfather telling me stories about how they used to finish everything and sit together to watch Boris Becker play, back in the day. From what I’ve heard and read, the broadcasting of tennis India wasn’t as big as it is becoming today. I specifically used the word becoming here, since I believe it’s still not even half of what it can get to. We don’t get to see anything about the WTA tour apart from the four majors, so that’ll be a good thing to look for going ahead, which will inspire a lot of young girls in the country to take up the sport.

I only started playing the sport during the summer holidays after my 10th. Till then, it was mostly cricket and football along with badminton and basketball to some extent. We even had a tennis court in our society, but we would mostly remove the net and use it to play cricket and football. Even though I used to watch a lot of tennis on TV and I knew most of the players and the rules of the game, I never actually thought of playing it till that point. But when I finished my 10th grade, I got busy with various classes and studies soon after the summer break. So, playing cricket wasn’t possible as the timings wouldn’t match. There was a well-known club nearby to my class which also had four tennis courts. I knew I couldn’t stay away from the game for far too long, so I enrolled. We had an old double-framed tennis racquet at our place, which my dad used to play with, back in the day. So, I started with that, but soon after my dad gifted me a brand-new HEAD PCT Fire, which I still have. It has a little crack on the frame, so I can’t use it now but somehow, I have always ended up using HEAD till now. No, my idol isn’t Novak Djokovic, but I have always liked and felt that it suits my style of play more than any other brand.

The Process and The People

The best part of playing tennis or any other sport you like is the friendship you build through it. Also, having the kind of people who push you towards getting better each day, is the best thing that you can ask for not just in sports but in every aspect of life. Tennis is not an easy game by any means and it takes months to get used to the right technique, the perfect speed and you need to practice day in day out to reach at least bare minimum level. But the process is fun. I could play to a certain extent with the amount of knowledge I had by the years of watching the game but it took me 2-3 years to understand and get control over my game. At one point I was just running to an extent when my fitness trainer said, you could be better at athletics than at tennis.

During my graduation, I left the academy where I first started playing for a relatively smaller one which was recently started by one of my previous coaches who also happened to be my good friend. That’s where my game actually transformed because training in a smaller academy meant I could work more closely with the coaches and got a lot more game time. Me along with one other friend (who used to beat me often), the head coach Parth and the assistant coach Azar, the four of us had a really good bond together and that’s what made playing more fun. We used to challenge each other every day and the losers would have to serve the punishment, that would either include 50 rounds to the court or minimum 100 pushups and 1000 skipping ropes. These little things pushed us in a good way.

Coaching in a summer camp

One of the absolute advantages of playing in a smaller academy and performing at a relatively good level meant that, me and my hitting partner got an opportunity to work with some amazing kids in the U-10 category. Teaching them from absolute basics to hitting balls with them for about two months, was something that taught us lot about our game and we could already tell how these kids would surpass us one day, having started at an early age.

This article would be incomplete without a crazy story about how I got my first ever AITA point

I haven’t had a chance to play a lot of tournaments apart from a few ones in Pune and Bengaluru. So, when my coach asked if I fancy playing in Panchagani, which is a small hill station near Pune, I said oh yes, I’m in. We travelled by his car to the destination on the previous day, it is two and a half hours drive from Pune. The next day, we signed in for the qualifiers where I lost in the second round of qualies and my sir won his first two matches and had his final qualifying the next day. So, I decide to stay for one more night and see how his match goes on the next day. First of all, the facilities and the courts there are nothing like what I had previously experienced playing on. We spent an entire day by the courtside and since it was a month of December, the weather and the views were spectacular. Parth, unfortunately lost the next day so I returned home, only to get a call from him at 7.30 pm in the night. “There are many spots open for the lucky losers and not many players are here. So, if you manage to come somehow by tonight, and luckily if no one from the main draw turns up tomorrow morning, there’s a fair chance you could get to play your first ever main draw match,” he said. The next thing I knew was I was in the bus with one of my other friends, reached there around 10.30, got entry into the main draw the next day, though I lost to the eventual finalist in the first round. Not the ideal way I wanted to earn my first ever point but still it was all worth it.