The Hindu : Divij jumps to No. 5 in the world

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Oct 22, 2003

Sport

Sport - Tennis

Divij jumps to No. 5 in the world

NEW DELHI OCT. 21. Divij Sharan has jumped to No.5 in the ITF junior doubles ranking as per the latest list released this week. The 17-year-old student of Shri Ram College of Commerce in the capital, had broken into the top-10 of the world rankings last week, following the doubles crown with R. Arun Prakash in the Grade `A' Osaka super juniors tournament in Japan.

From winning the first of his five ITF junior doubles titles in September last year, Divij has indeed come a long way, in one year, when he also had to focus on his 12th standard examinations that saw him score 82 per cent.

The pair, that has been playing together only this season, won the grade `II' tournament last week in Hong Kong, which pushed Divij to be among the top-5 in the world, with 520 ranking points, while the 18-year-old Arun Prakash himself reached No.10 with 475 points.

While Divij has played 12 international tournaments this season in the junior circuit, all of them abroad in Uzbekistan, Morocco, South Africa, Canada, US, Japan and Hong Kong, his doubles partner, Arun Prakash has played only eight tournaments in all.

In fact, Arun Prakash did not play any ITF junior tournaments last year, though he was the most talented junior on view in the Indian circuit, as he asserted his class by winning the national junior singles title in Delhi. Divij had won the doubles crown then with Tushar Liberhan, and had tried his hand with mixed luck in ITF tournaments in Sri Lanka, Philippines and Ukraine.

Thus, from literally being nowhere at the beginning of the season, Divij and Arun Prakash, listed at No.147 and No.668 respectively in the 2002 year-end doubles rankings, have shot up in a meteoric fashion. While Divij got a wild card into the US Open, Arun Prakash did not have any such luck. It was the maiden entry in a Grand Slam for Divij, but he could not show his ability in doubles as the event was cancelled, following repeated rain interruptions.

While Sania Mirza made it to the top-5, and eventually to the No.1 slot in the girls' doubles, in a dramatic fashion, by becoming the Wimbledon junior champion, the two boys have literally sneaked through in a quiet manner to be among the best in the business of junior tennis.

In fact, it was Karan Rastogi and Somdev Dev Varman, who had drawn attention, rightly so, with their deeds for the better part of the season when they won the big titles in grade `I' events around the world. At present Karan is ranked No.12 and Somdev No.15 in the doubles rankings, with 465 and 450 points.

Tushar Liberhan with whom Divij had won his first ITF doubles title is ranked No.154 this week.

Karan has the honour of being high up the singles ladder, at No.23 with 440 points. The 17-year-old Mumbaikar made the singles semifinals in Osaka and went down with guns blazing against the world No.1, Marcos Baghdatis of Cyprus, after having held three matchpoints.

While Arun Prakash has moved to be No. 68, jumping 58 places from the previous week's ranking, following the title in Hong Kong, Somdev is ranked 62, Divij 104 and Tushar 131 among the leading Indian juniors.

Sania Mirza who has started focusing fully on the senior circuit after the US Open, is ranked No.2 in doubles and No.31 in singles among the juniors. Sanaa Bhambri is No.51 in singles and No.19 in doubles while Tara Iyer is the third best Indian junior girl on the computer at No.80 in singles and No.136 in doubles.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Sport