Tennis tourney ends on a high for Udayan Bhakar

LUDHIANA: There was a proud moment for Harvest Tennis Academy of Jassowal village of Ludhiana, as their trainee Udayan Bhakar, 13, won his maiden national title in 6th Ramesh Desai Memorial All India Ranking National Tennis Championship - 2012 recently held in Mumbai. Udayan outsmarted top seed I B Akshay of Tamil Nadu by 6-4, 6-4 in the two-hour final played on Saturday.
Udayan returned on Monday evening. Talking about his experience of playing among the top players in Mumbai, he said, ‘‘I defeated five seeded players in the tournament on my way to the finals. The final was intense with both the players holding serves for most of the match, but I dominated the game overall,’’ said the budding player, who is very happy with himself for putting up a tough match against an experienced player.
With his roots in Rajasthan, Udayan came to city just 18 months back and since then has been practising in the academy under Australian coach Todd Clark. Udayan said, ‘‘The tournament was a great learning experience.” ‘‘Akshay was under pressure as he was the top seed and I knew that I had nothing to lose so I went out there and played my natural game,” said Udayan. Coach Clark said, ‘‘I am delighted with the success of my trainee. Udayan has great potential to beat any top seed.”
Ankush Arora, 15, of BRS Nagar had also participated in this tournament lost in the quarterfinals. ‘‘For me the tournament was great exposure. I tried very hard to win the title but unfortunately lost,” he said.
A diehard fan of Roger Federer, Ankush said, ‘‘Before Ramesh Desai National Tournament I played another tournament, Prac Tennis Competition which was also held at Mumbai. At present, I rank 41 on All India Tennis Association (AITA) and hope to reach rank no. 1 soon.’’