New Delhi: The All India Tennis Association (AITA) named Leander Paes and Rohan Bopanna along with Saketh Myneni in the team for the Davis Cup World Group Play-off tie against Spain. The match will be held at the R.K. Khanna Tennis Stadium here from September 16-18.
Paes and Bopanna, with a long history of acrimonious relations between them, paired up for the Rio Olympics earlier this month only to be beaten in the first round.
The AITA selection committee retained all the four players that beat South Korea 4-1 in July.
Myneni and Ramkumar Ramanathan are expected to play the singles matches while Paes-Bopanna will do the doubles duty.
Myneni and Ramanathan won their respective first leg singles matches against South Korea while Paes and Bopanna won the doubles match.
Mahesh Bhupathi, Paes’ ex-partner and part of the famed ‘Indian Express,’ said Paes and Bopanna did not practise or play enough together to give themselves a decent chance to win a medal in the men’s doubles event.
“The [men’s] doubles team was definitely under-prepared, in fact there was no preparation — that’s the right word. They did not practise, did not play any matches together. Even when Leander and me were not playing on tour in 2004 and 2008 [Olympic Games in Athens and Beijing], we always came together, played a couple of tournaments together. That’s what the Olympics demands,” said Bhupathi here at the Khar Gymkhana here.
“We [he and Paes] won three hundred matches on (ATP) Tour, [but] we [still] made an effort to do it. This time they went in cold. Obviously one [doubles] match against a dilapidated Korean Davis Cup team is not the way to prepare for the Olympics,” said Bhupathi on the sidelines of the 11Even Sports Inter Schools Maharashtra table tennis tournament where he was the chief guest at the inauguration.
“That [medal] was never going to happen in the doubles. Our best bet was mixed [doubles], but unfortunately we [India] came close, but it did not happen,” said the 42-year-old Bhupathi who has won three men’s doubles and four mixed doubles titles in Grand Slam tournaments.
He was referring to Bopanna and Sania Mirza’s loss in the semi-finals against the scratch US combine of Venus Williams and Rajeev Ram.
They then lost in the bronze medal play-off too to finish outside the medal bracket.
Asked whether he was disappointed at the controversial build-up around India’s men’s doubles team in the run-up to the Games and just before the duo stepped on court, Mahesh said he was happy things did not escalate. “Everybody expected it. Everyone was keeping quiet till it actually surfaced. I am happy it did not get out of hand,” he said.
