When it comes to the Davis Cup, Somdev Devvarman has big boots to fill.
For a country without a structured system to nurture tennis talent, India has been incredibly lucky. Abundant, untamed talent sprouted in the 1960s and 70s: Ramanathan Krishnan, Premjit Lall, Jaideep Mukherjee, S P Misra and, a little later, Vijay Amritraj and, still later, Ramesh Krishnan. They were not world beaters in the manner of a Borg or a McEnroe; they were good, honest men who could do wonders on their day. The result was that, even though no Indian has gone past the semi-final of a Grand Slam, the country has made it to three finals of the Davis Cup, the only tournament in which male tennis players form a team to represent their country. (For women, it’s the Federation Cup.)
In the 1990s, there was Leander Paes, who always managed to extract that little extra something out of himself when playing for the country. On his day, he could — and did — take out the top players, though his singles career on the circuit never matched the heights he attained in the doubles.
The latest good fortune is Somdev Devvarman’s decision to represent his country of origin in the Davis Cup. Making his debut for India, the world number 150 trounced Lu Yen-Hsun, ranked nearly 100 places above him, to secure a tight 3-2 win over Chinese Taipei and take his team into the third and final round of the Asia/Oceania Group I competition. Lu has beaten the likes of David Nalbandian and former world number one Lleyton Hewitt this season. Devvarman also won his first singles in the tie, while Paes-Bhupathy won the doubles.
Ever since Paes declined as a singles force, India has been struggling in the Davis Cup. We last played the elite world group in 1998. Bhupathy never became a major singles player and those that followed — Rohan Bopanna, Prakash Amritraj, et cetera — did not quite deliver. (Bopanna lost both his matches against Chinese Taipei.)
The thing is that Devvarman could just as easily not have represented India. His home town is Chennai, but a campus visit to Virginia, in the United States, changed it all. The skinny right-hander drew interest from a handful of small American colleges, but Virginia coach Brian Boland impressed Devvarman by travelling to Chennai for a recruiting visit. Four years later, Devvarman graduated with the reputation of one of the best collegiate tennis players ever.
He is not a spring chicken, but Indians do tend to mature late and last longer. Devvarman has the pedigree and, given his years on the US college circuit, perhaps the maturity to handle the grind. Most importantly, he has the right passport. But it is time India stopped depending on such fortuitous circumstances.
