Saketh Myneni, who won tennis gold, talks about the future and his shot at the Olympics
Saketh Myneni
After winning a Gold and a Silver at the recent Asian Games in tennis, Saketh Myneni received a stunning welcome from people in hometown, Vizag, on Saturday. Saketh had put his life and soul into tennis since his schooldays. “I’ve always been low-profile when it comes to both sport and personal life. The reason is because of my schedule I have been travelling a lot. From Vizag, I moved to Hyderabad and then to the US. I feel it’s a good thing to maintain a low-profile and at the same time it’s wonderful when you are able to bring medals to the country, even when you were not in the limelight.
“Tennis is an individual sport, so you are not known unless you play for a team and that might be the reason I wasn’t noticed until now,” he says.Having started professional tennis after college, Saketh, a double major in economics from University of Alabama, says the news of him playing with Sania Mirza at the Asian Games came as a total surprise.
“I got to know that I was playing with Sania just two days before the game. I was overwhelmed by the opportunity — expectations were high, but I kept my cool. I knew Sania, and had played with her before, so it wasn’t tough for us to get along on the court at the Asian Games.” In fact, it was Sania’s idea to push ahead with Saketh. “She had to pick who she wanted to play with. I think I was lucky and we played together and won the Gold. I had an opportunity to prove myself in Davis Cup this year, I think I did well and that was in my favour,” he adds.
Talking about playing with Sania, he adds, “There is a reason why she’s in the world’s Top 5. Sania has unbelievable charisma and you get to learn a lot from her.”Saketh adds: “My first coach in Vizag, Kishore Sir, helped me a lot with the basics and I moved to Hyderabad for more extensive training. I also wanted to play in a competitive environment and turn professional. There was Sania and there were many other players from Hyderabad, so I decided to move.
“Then, I wanted to get a degree and checked a couple of colleges in the US where I could study as well as improve my tennis. The coach from University of Alabama watched a few videos of me playing and he wanted to see if it worked out with me going to the US and it did work out,” he adds. With just two years for the next Olympic Games, Saketh says that he is working towards making it to the Top 100.
And giving advice to sports enthusiasts, Saketh says, “Your long-term goal has to be set properly. To get to that, you should fulfil your short-term goals one at a time. Keep working, keep training as much as you can.”
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