It would be a heart-breaking day for all the Sania Mirza fans around the globe. She has just lost the finals of the Bank of the West Classic tournament in Stanford, California. This was one good chance for her to win a second WTA title after the first one in Hyderabad. Having beaten 3 top-twenty players in the run-up to the final, she looked to be on course for the title. But then she has meekly succumbed to her opponent in the final.I did not see the match, but just followed the scores through the net. From the way, the score board ticked, the final score (6-3, 6-2) and from the total duration of the match, it looks like Anna Chakvetadze had the upper hand throughout the match. And that is why she was the top seed in the tournament.
Sania on her part seems to have been bitten by the "Great Indian Sports Jinx". She appeared to play really well all through the tournament and finally when it is time to reap the benefits of her performance, she stumbles in the last hurdle. This seems to be a jinx that is affecting all spheres of Indian sports (It even seems to affect me at my level of playing any game :) ). Our sportsmen in so many disciplines, be it cricket, weight lifting, Boxing, hockey, tennis, shooting, archery ... seem to be doing well until the final stage of a tournament. But then something overcomes them and they seem to fail at the last moment. We've witnessed this so often in major tournaments - World cups, Olympics, Asian games, Commonwealths and so on.
Sports always takes a backseat in India. As long as the government and the public do not give importance to this field, we should not expect any great results. But this doesn't mean that there are no talented sports persons in our country. We know that they are capable of winning and we see some good performances in smaller tournaments. But somehow they fail to deliver in the big stage. This seems to afflict all sports irrespective of how popular the sport is. We all hope this jinx is broken soon and we see some good results. Sania has to play the doubles finals now and she is also taking part in a tournament in San Diego next week. Hope she sees some success there.
3 comments:
Sania did play pretty well and many of the games today went to deuce..so it wasnt as one sided as the scoreline suggests but yes Chekvetadze did control the game and managed to exploit Sania's weaknesses. But a big improvement in Sania's game and I am sure she will be in the top 30 soon enough if she continues this vein of form.
I agree with u that sports does take a backseat and academics is the focus in indian upbringing. And as to the final jinx it can perhaps be attributed to the weight of expectation of a billion hearts...and perhaps to the softer nature of Indians in general. We dont have the brutal killer instinct that people like the Aussies naturally have.
Sania will soon come out good if she continues her game like she did last week. She will soon move into top 30. My wish is to see her win a Grand slam title.
hmm...i hope we arent making our homegrown tennis bimbo. I didnt see any of her matches so I leave it to the experts to comment more.
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