"Indian tennis has improved drastically, but a long way to go": Interview with India #2 Saketh Myneni

Myneni won the title at the ATP Indore Challenger last year

He’s rising up the ranks quickly, and is currently at his career-highest ATP Ranking of 123. India’s #2 singles player Saketh Myneni is in Bengaluru to play the AirAsia Open, and turned 28 yesterday.

The gold and silver medal winner at the 2014 Asian Games spoke to Sportskeeda in an exclusive interview.

Excerpts:

How did your affair with tennis begin?

I was always an athletic kid, I loved playing sports. Growing up in Vishakhapatnam, I was always keen on sports, and stayed outdoors a lot. I wasn’t one of those kids who knew straight away at 5, 6 years old that I wanted to play tennis; in comparison, I started quite late. I was 11 when I got properly invested in tennis, and it only went up from there.

I’d play in clubs with older ‘uncles’ and learn from them, and by 14 my parents and I decided I should move to a city with better facilities and infrastructure for training. That route led me to Hyderabad, where I began training in earnest. I lived with my grandparents there, and invested my life in the sport. My parents and grandparents have been my biggest, most crucial support through my tennis career so far – without them, I don’t think I would have reached as far as I have.

It wasn’t just them, though. My coaches were also incredibly supportive, and adapted to my playing and learning styles quickly. The coaching style is crucial, absolutely crucial to how a player turns out. It shapes him or her, makes the person the player they are. It is also essential that a player’s fundamentals are strong, and the onus of this is on the coach, ensuring the student has the basics down perfectly before they progress to the more advanced stuff.

Usually how it happens is, there’s a group of 5-10 children, all with a single coach, the coach explains techniques and basics to that group of kids, who watch him and ape what he’s doing. But at that young age, it’s essential that students have some form of individual attention. Learning styles are as vastly different as playing styles, and that needs to be recognised too.

Coaches, too, need to suss out the strengths and weaknesses of their students to be able to work on specific skills, perhaps more than others, and so smaller, more focussed training is very important for tennis.

What kind of learner and player would you consider yourself?

I’m very visual, always have been. I’m a quick learner, but I’ve never been one to be explained things and follow them. I’m more of a visual learner. I watched my coaches and picked up what they taught me – but that’s not it. As a youngster, I played a lot in local clubs and stuff – I played with older men, people my age, everyone of every age and skill group, really, and I watched all of them.

And I think that is key in learning, in being a good player. Watching others, picking up on their tips, little tricks in their playing. I still do that, watch others play to pick up little things here and there.

I’m the sort of player who likes to try it all myself, and I think nobody should ever stop learning, no matter how old you are or at what stage of your career you are. It doesn’t matter. You should always be open to learn, willing to pick up new skills, and that is what prevents player attrition.

Learning from yourself is really important, too. When I was in college (Myneni went to college in Alabama for four years) I coached younger kids, and taught myself

I did it as a kid, and I do it now, and it’s been crucial in helping me move forward.

You may have kept your core values intact since then, but what do you think has changed for Indian tennis as a whole since you were a child?

Oh, infrastructure. It’s definitely improved, exponentially better than it was before, but there are still miles to go before we can say they are at an international standard. There is still extensive travel involved in properly training,

It’s one of the major factors that was involved in my move to Hyderabad from Vizag, and I made a number of sacrifices to get there.

What are some of the biggest sacrifices you (and professional tennis players, in your opinion) make in the pursuit of their careers?

Definitely giving up on a ‘normal’ life. I had to move in with my grandparents, whose support I am immensely grateful for, but I missed my parents, whom I could not live with because the tennis infrastructure in Visakhapatnam was just not good enough for me to able to pursue the sport there.

I, and other sportspeople, miss the regular ‘teenage things’ kids do, growing up, hanging out with friends, being an adolescent, really. Training takes that all away from you, although it is all worth it you miss it quite a bit.

What do you think kids training for tennis, aspiring to be tennis players, need to know these days?

They need to realise, and understand deeply, that they should not blindly ape everything they see their favourite players doing. The SABR may work for Roger Federer, but it might not for you. Players develop their skills and ‘weapons’ to suit those skills, to be able to catch their opponents out in the best way possible.

Kids need to understand their own game, work on it, and work on adapting that game to new skills rather than adopting the nuances of a game that is not theirs, not for their playing style, body type or may not suit them at all.

You’ve found success in both singles and doubles, but you blitzed your opponents at the doubles in 2014 at the Asiad. What is something you think is very important for the game?

Doubles is fun, but it’s also taxing in many ways. You have to really understand your partner, be friends with them. That is essential, that chemistry is what can make or break a team. I knew Sanam (Singh) and Sania before I played with them.

Myneni won Gold at the mixed doubles with Mirza in 2014, and silver with Sanam Singh at the Asian Games in Incheon, South Korea.

You learn the other person’s strengths, weaknesses, their style of play, how they execute the smallest shots and the most elaborate ones. And you pick up on that, you watchthem and learn as you adapt yourself to be the best, most effective partner you can be as well.

India’s more doubles focused, but I want to take singles forward. I’ll be playing in this year’s Champions Tennis League and I’m really looking forward to it.

The Indian ace played for the Pune Marathas last year, and has switched teams this year. He’ll play with the Punjab Marshalls, with tennis legends such as Marcos Baghdatis on his team as well.