‘I will play only singles from now,’ says Zeel Desai, India’s next big hope in women’s tennis

“I am really proud that I am the top Indian junior. It makes me feel confident for my upcoming tournaments.”

– Zeel Desai to Scroll.in after her win at the ITF Juniors Grade II tournament in Tin Hau, Hong Kong, in November 2016.

The mainstay of sporting action in the Indian construct, during this past weekend, was governed by the strenuousness of India taking of Australia in the second of their four-match Test series. However, even as the hosting team struggled to live up to their billing as the world’s best Test side against the visiting Australians, except for in patches, it was a far removed story for the Indians in the tennis circuit.

There were the usual stalwarts in Leander Paes and Rohan Bopanna, who respectively made it to the semi-finals and final of the Dubai Open. And invariably, the duo’s rounding off of a successful week, once again, added to the dilemma of India’s Davis Cup team selection for its upcoming tie against Uzbekistan, in April.

It was, however, in the women’s half of the game that the better narrative shaped up, as Zeel Desai, India’s top-ranked junior girls player, marked a convincing changeover to the Pro Tour from the junior circuit with her first ITF career title at the $15,000 tournament in Gwalior.

No stranger to re-shaping the spectrum of Indian women’s tennis, most furiously in the course of the last six months, this latest achievement of the 18-year-old marks a newer pivot in what she has been perceived to be for the future of Indian women’s tennis.

The win in the final, over Mahak Jain, her 15-year-old colleague in the junior Tour, came in straight sets for Desai. Nonetheless, it was the tough start to her week, with her needing the full quota of three sets to get through in her first two rounds that upped her credentials as a champion.

Making the most of her transition: from Junior to the Pro Circuit

In a conversation with Scroll.in from Nonthaburi in Thailand, where she is playing the ITF Juniors Grade I event this week, immediately on the heels of her success in Gwalior, Desai too evaluated her initial two matchups as the key to eventual success. “Usually, during the matches I am focused and disciplined,” she stated. “I just have that mentality to keep fighting for every point, even when I am down [in my matches, like in Gwalior.]”

While she may have the mental aspect of her game down pat, there are a handful of technical aspects that Desai feels she needs to improve. “I want to improve my serve so that I can dominate the points. It is getting better, but I want to improve it [some] more,” she said. Given that a good serve is regarded to be the key requisite for any player to have a solid foundation to one’s game, especially on the Pro Tour, where the margin of competitiveness turning narrower and sharper, Desai’s self-analysis has broader undertones despite its simplicity of explanation.

Just as easy to gauge is her rationale on prioritising singles over doubles in the women’s Tour, as she did last week in Gwalior. “From now onwards, in women’s tournaments, I will be playing only singles because I want to focus on my singles game,” Desai clarified regarding her preparations in the Pro circuit. “That’s why I didn’t play doubles [in Gwalior] because I knew [the matches] were going to be tough. So, I just wanted to give [my] 100%. I want to focus on my singles more on the Pro Tour.”

Unlike in the ATP and WTA circuit, where singles and doubles ranking are calculated separately, the ITF junior Tour features a combined ranking of both singles and doubles for boys and girls. As such, while it is easier to sustain in the junior circuit by clubbing doubles with singles, the heightened pace in the professional circuit makes it a challenging ask for players to keep playing both, and do so for the entirety of the season, from January to November.

A determined step towards the future

Much as she doesn’t want to pressure herself right at the start of her professional career, Desai, however, isn’t unaware of the added importance of ranking points, even in the ITF Tour, right start of a player’s pro career.

As compared to the ATP and WTA Tours, the ITF arm of the Pro tennis circuit lies significantly obscured, except on those occasions when the tournaments associated with the ITF, namely the Davis and Fed Cups, present themselves as topics of discussion. However, given that the ITF circuit adds to the players’ points tally pegging them higher on the ATP and WTA rankings, doing well in the ITF means a whole lot more, especially from the Indian tennis perspective.

For Desai, who is currently the 12th highest-ranked Indian player in the WTA ranking in the 851st place and who is playing her last season as a junior, there’s also the coupled responsibility of improving her junior ranking well in time for the French Open. “I am here in Thailand and then I am playing in Malaysia so that I can get some points and be seeded for the Junior French Open,” said Desai.

Speaking of the Junior Slams, it’s impossible to brush aside Desai’s Australian Open heroics regardless of the passage of time. Piercing as the momentousness was, what highlighted the Ahmedabad native’s achievement – of reaching the quarter-finals in the Junior Major – even more was the fact that it came without any precedents, and when least expected.

Desai though isn’t satisfied with that one accomplishment, and it has become the impetus for her aspirations ahead in her career. “I was the first player in 65 years to make it to the quarter-final of a Grand Slam [both in Juniors as well as Seniors],” began Desai, before saying, “I was very proud and I would like to make India proud in other such big events like the Commonwealth Games, Asian Games and the Olympics.”