I still have some magic: Baghdatis

Being an islander, Marcos Bagdhdatis is naturally drawn towards the sun, to all things happy and bright. Being a professional athlete, in an era where winning has become paramount, hasn’t always afforded him that luxury. But Baghdatis has refused to lose himself in the game of shadows that modern tennis has become.

“If I have to, I am comfortable leaving the game even right now,” says the Cypriot, seated in the café of a luxury hotel in Mumbai.

“That is because of the life I have built for myself outside tennis. I have a base, a family, something I would be happy to spend the rest of my life with,” he says. It is off-season for most but Baghdatis has travelled to India for the Champions Tennis League, giving him an opportunity to train as well as play a few competitive sets, but most of all escape the chill of the European winter.

Even the big eyes or big smile don’t carry a hint of underachievement, as perceived by the rest, on the tennis court. Baghdatis is 30, has bounced around the ranking charts more than the fuzzy yellow ball he’s made a career chasing. His biggest success lies well into the past, almost 10 years ago.

That Australian Open in 2006.

“It’s a feeling that you cannot describe,” says Baghdatis of those Melbourne moments. “Making the quarterfinal, winning the semifinal and then all of a sudden you are in the final of a Grand Slam, playing Roger Federer. I had a great run; I was just 20 years old. So it was something new for me, for my family. For everybody in my team it was something new. I didn’t have experienced people around me to guide me; to achieve that with them was great for all of us. We enjoyed it a lot.”

The massive Greek-Cypriot contingent in Melbourne was out to cheer him. Baghdatis did eventually lose the final 5–7, 7–5, 6–0, 6–2. But it was a year tennis saw the full force of Baghdatis and fell in love with the man from Cyprus.

He is unpredictable; he is expressive. He says he craves the connection with the crowd, the energy that comes from them. Maybe that’s why the toughest moment of his career was when he found himself suddenly all alone among 23,000 Americans. In 2006, Andre Agassi was playing his last US Open, pushing the boundaries of excellence at the age of 36. Baghdatis stood across the net from him. The fans usually love Marcos, but right now they only had a voice for Andre.

“I was not playing against Andre only I was playing against 23,000 people in the Arthur Ashe stadium,” he recalls. “It was like a nightmare in there. It was the toughest match I have played in my life, the toughest atmosphere I played in my life.”

Baghdatis lost the second round thriller 4–6, 4–6, 6–3, 7–5, 5–7. The last professional match that Agassi won. “ He was one of my big heroes growing up. For me it was an honor to play against him, an honor to be in his book (autobiography called Open), not an honor to be the last one he beat!”

He had also reached the semi-finals at Wimbledon that year and made it to no 8 in the rankings in August. Then the light in him dimmed.

“I wasn’t ready to handle that kind of success,” he admits. “If you see the results later I wasn’t 100% ready for it.” Sometimes complacent, sometimes compelling, Baghdatis was forever a work in progress. The reason, he says, was in the way he was yanked away from home, in Limassol, to train at the Mouratoglou Tennis Academy in dank and cold Paris as a 13-year-old.

“I left a lot of people that I loved and had to find a new life. After the Australian Open, the biggest decision-- that was not the best one-- was to go back to Cyprus. I relaxed a bit by doing that, because I missed that. As a teenager leaving your country, your people and not seeing them very often. Once I achieved something I went back and I kind of relaxed. That was a small mistake that took me down, that made me have injuries. I didn’t take care of my body as I should have or as do I now. It’s something that I learnt over the years.”

There have been false dawns for Baghdatis. 2010 brought hope: he was the only player in the year to beat Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal when they were ranked No 1; he was back in the top-20. That didn’t last long either.

“There were moments when I wasn’t happy playing tennis; I wasn’t happy being on the road. I wasn’t myself,” he says. Injuries and indiscipline on court however gave him time to put his personal life in order. He married fellow tennis player, Karolina Sprem of Croatia in 2012 and has a daughter, Zahara, who now commands his attention.

He grew up faster as a person than as a tennis player.

“Maybe I could have had more finals or more ATP tournament wins or more consistent career,” he says.

“I took decisions that were not the best for my tennis; but they were best for me as a person. I felt happy again, I felt happy with myself. I found a way to stabilize my life. Now I have a wife, I have a lovely daughter, which I am grateful for. Maybe if I took that decision (for tennis) I wouldn’t have those things. So it’s a give and take situation. When you achieve something when you are very young, you want to see something different in life, some other emotions. Enjoying life a bit and that’s what I did. I don’t regret it.”

About a year and a half ago, languishing at 155 of the world, Baghdatis had to make the decision about his career. His team, with his wife front and centre, coaxed him back into the game. Fitness became a priority. He had more than just himself to think for.

“In last year and a half or two we decided to train less in tennis and take more care of my body. We have worked a lot in recovering my body in a way to avoid injuries, major injuries. 2015 was a good year,” he points out. “My season was solid, competition wise, I was pretty consistent on the court and I felt pretty good every match I played.” He did not win a title but has worked himself up to 46 in the rankings. A number that is still not an indicator of big ball-striking talent.

“I have a small goal, which is to get into the top 30 by the end of next year. Slowly, slowly play another full year of competition at this level. I need that. You cannot expect to go from 50 to top-10 immediately.”

Does he have a Grand Slam title in him?

“Right now, no,” Baghdatis admits. “I don’t think I am physically at that level. To go deep into a Grand Slam, maybe. I don’t know how long my body, my legs and my mind will hold up, but I think I still have another three years in me. The last year I think will be the best one. For the moment, physically I don’t think I am at that level of (Novak) Djokovic, Federer, Nadal, (Stan) Wawrinka, (Andy) Murray, it’s not just one guy.”

“But if I go into the second week of the Grand Slam, a bit of luck, a bit of magic-- because I think I have still have some magic in my tennis—anything can happen after that,” he says, the dream coming back into focus.

Tennis would be richer if the sunny Cypriot catches that golden light again.

Tennis and the art of losing

Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.

These words by famous playwright Samuel Beckett are inked deep into Stanislas Wawrinka’s arm. The reigning French Open champion knows a thing or two about losing, about losing well and thus about winning.

"It’s how I see life and tennis," Wawrinka has been quoted saying about the tattoo. "The meaning of the quote doesn’t change no matter how well you do. There is always disappointment, heartache. You are losing almost every tournament. You need to just accept it and be positive because you are going to lose and fail...In life you are always going to have some problem or pain and you have to live by this quote. It’s still not easy but I’m dealing better with it all."

Wawrinka was just a couple of months short of his 29th birthday, when he shunned failure and emerged a Grand Slam winner at the Australian Open in 2014. It took him twelve years on the pro tour and conquering endless doubts to get there.

But the week in-week out intensity of tennis demands that getting there is not enough. You have to keep going, another day, another week, another tournament. You are only as good as your last tournament.

Wawrinka’s fellow Swiss Roger Federer has won 17 Grand Slams and 85 tour titles, the last of which was the Istanbul Open on Sunday, May 3. But till he wins another one, he will be persistently questioned, directly or subtly, about the ones he has missed so far this year.

That monster Federer famously spoke about after his 2008 semi-final loss to Novak Djokovic at the Australian Open – “I've created a monster, so I know I need to always win every tournament,” were his exact words – is still alive and well. A Federer defeat may not create waves anymore, but it still sends a ripple. Or grabs headlines at the least.

The man himself has learnt to get over it, and get over it quickly.

After losing 6‑3, 6‑7, 6‑2 to the same Djokovic at this year’s Indian Wells final, Federer said he would forget about the match “in like 25 minutes or so.” “I'm not going to look back on that match, on that moment very long,” he said in the post-match press conference.

It’s been a long journey for the Swiss, who once claimed that he cried “after I lost every single match from eight to basically 15.” In an interview last year he said that the defeat which hurt most was the one against Tommy Haas in the semi-final of the 2000 Sydney Olympics.

"I was really inconsolable...When I lost I curled up in a corner like a child for a long time. I could not stop crying. That defeat marked me. I lost the next day against (Frenchman) Arnaud di Pasquale and again I wept the whole day,” he recalled. Eventually, he got up and won the world.

The way the game is structured, players are going to lose points, games, sets and matches. In a calendar year, when they play almost every alternate week, they are going to lose more tournaments than they win. Federer is the most successful Grand Slam player in the history of the men’s game, but he has still lost more majors than he has won. At the end of a Slam fortnight, there are 127 losers and only one winner.

“You win five matches and lose one and you’re a loser,” Andre Agassi had said during an interview, just before his autobiography ‘Open’ was to be released in 2010.

“You can win six matches and lose one and you’re a loser and you can win a tournament and have to play the next tournament and lose and you’re only as good as your last results. So there was always that never ending kind of pressure that came along with it that seemed to carry the day at the end.”

In the book itself, he writes: ‘I've been let in on a dirty little secret: winning changes nothing. Now that I've won a slam, I know something that very few people on earth are permitted to know. A win doesn't feel as good as a loss feels bad, and the good feeling doesn't last as long as the bad. Not even close.’

It presumably gets more difficult more players as you go further down the rankings; the losses really start to stack up. Half way through the 2015 season, this is how the win-loss record stand on the ATP tour: world No 1 Novak Djokovic is at 41-3, world No 10 Nadal is at 33-10, world no 24 Bernard Tomic at 24-14, world No 37 Jeremy Chardy at 14-14, world No 62 Santiago Giraldo at 15-16, world No 83 Denis Istomin at 6-14 and world No 96 Ruben Bemelmans at 0-5.

A former player on the ITF Futures (lowest rung of pro events) tour, Vaja Uzakov had, in 2008 summed up the feeling of the players who are restricted to the fringes of the game. “After practicing so much, working so hard, you dont win. Then you think what are you doing here? People who are not broken in the mind continue, the others stop playing,” Uzakov had said during an ITF $15,000 even in Mumbai. The Uzbek could never really break out of the losing cycle, reached a career high of 698 in 2010. He is 27 now and already out of the game.

Rafael Nadal has also had to develop resilience towards defeats recently. Almost unbeatable on clay in the last decade, the Spaniard won only one tournament on the red dirt this season. At the French Open, where he had won nine titles in 10 years, he was beaten in straight set by a rampaging Djokovic in the quarterfinals.

“Everybody lose in every place,” he said after the defeat on June 3, his 29th birthday. “I lost not many times here, and that day arrived today. Again, accept like I always accept the defeats, and the only thing (that) is there: I want to work harder even than before to come back stronger.”

Nadal has won 33 and lost 11 this year, the latest being a first-round loss against Ukraine’s Alexandr Dolgopolov in the first round of the Queen’s tournament.

Every loss hurts, some more than the other. Players cry, whine, sulk. Learn. They develop an arduous relationship with defeat, one that is often laced sense of with inevitability. It is a professional hazard. They know the cloak of invincibility eventually wears thin.

“You have to learn to lose well,” Andy Murray, a two-time major winner, said during the Dubai Open, which ran from February 23-28.

“If you can't do that, then you're going to be very disappointed most weeks and not get much enjoyment out of playing tennis. There's 32 players here, that’s excluding the qualifying. Only one person can go home happy in that sense. It's important to understand that it's possible that each week you can lose. The goal is obviously to try to win the event, unfortunately not everyone can do that.”

Murray’s contemporary Djokovic was probably handed the most difficult task. He had to break the stranglehold of arguably two of the best players the game has ever seen—Federer and Nadal—to claim glory. The Serb lost to them enough times, before he finally learnt how to win.

“I remember when I was coming up and playing against Roger, Rafa, in big matches, I felt like the whole tournament I played great, and then against them, for some reason, it doesn't happen the way you want it,” he said, also in Dubai. “Doesn't necessarily mean that it's going to stay like that. You need to be the one making an impression on the court and showing you are there to win. That's what gives you that push.”

Djokovic, now 28, is an eight-time Grand Slam champion and has joined Federer and Nadal in the race for the greatest of the generation.

“It is a very mental game,” Djokovic concedes about tennis; a game of narrow margins. And one in which the difference between losing and losing it is a hair’s breadth.

Retired French tennis player Marion Bartoli knows all about being burdened by defeat. She lost in 46 successive Grand Slams before she finally won the 2013 Wimbledon Championships. A record in the women’s game.

“It takes a lot of courage, patience and love of the game to be able to live like this. Sometimes for 15 years in a row,” Bartoli, 30, said during her visit for the Mumbai Marathon in January. “I had some very tough moments, tough losses. But I always had this dream, and this fire inside me that I wanted to achieve so much that I did not want to give up till I made it happen.”

Bartoli has been there, done that.

On June 29, her fellow tennis players will line up again at the gates of Wimbledon’s Centre Court in the hunt for glory. Hoping they can live by this maxim, an extract from Rudyard Kipling’s poem ‘If’, that greets them at the Players’ Entrance: ‘If you can meet with triumph and disaster, and treat those two impostors just the same.’

Goran & Wimbledon: An affair to remember

There will be drama. You know there will be drama. Goran Ivanisevic is on the tennis court.

So people are here to watch him, even if he is only playing the doubles legends event at the French Open. Watch him win, lose, rifle aces, break a racket, make a racket. He is sharing court with three former champions: Michael Chang, Juan Carlos Ferrero and Carlos Moya. Ivanisevic still draws the loudest cheers. He’s the funny man holding court. For most people present there, he’s also the prince charming of tennis’ favourite fairytale.



A tear-stained Ivanisevic winning the 2001 Wimbledon title, the only wild card and the lowest ranked (125) player to do so, was nothing short of a miracle. It was an emotional, triumphant end to his often tumultuous journey at the grass-court Grand Slam. “Unbelievable” is the word Ivanisevic uses the most while describing it.

Almost 14 years after the day, his eyes still light up at the mention of Wimbledon. On a relaxed Thursday afternoon, with his protégé Marin Cilic already out of the French Open, Ivanisevic, sporting a bright red T-shirt, sits down at the Player’s Lounge at Roland Garros, to talk about the biggest moment of his career, one that people have still not stopped talking about.

“Nobody believed I could do it, even I didn’t believe,” says Ivanisevic. “I was just happy to get the wild card, to be back at Wimbledon. I was not expecting much, just that I didn’t want to do too badly.”

Since he was not among the top-100, he was unable to make a direct entry into the draw. Ivanisevic was given a wild card on the basis of his performance at earlier Wimbledons. He had made the finals thrice—1992, 1994 and 1998—and lost all of them, the first to Andre Agassi and the others to Pete Sampras.

“After losing three finals you really start doubting yourself,” says the Croat. “It was difficult to keep myself motivated. Getting to the final, it was like seeing the big mountain from the distance, and climbing it. And every time you think you are close to the top, Whoosh! It’s like someone hitting you in the head and you have to start all over again.”

The biggest blow was the 1998 final, when Ivanisevic defeated former champion Richard Krajicek in a marathon five-setter in the semi-final to set up a title clash with Sampras. The tall lefty with a monster serve stretched Sampras, the best grass court player on the planet then, to the fifth set. But that’s when things started to unravel, and the legs gave in.

“The grass, it looks really nice and green from the outside,” he says. “But it is really difficult to play on. It’s hard work. The ball is low, you have to bend. Not good for the knees”

Sampras said it was the toughest challenge he had ever had on grass till then. Ivanisevic declared, “I can only kill myself.”

It was always a matter of extremes for Ivanisevic: The “good Goran” who played like a champion; the “bad Goran”, who raised hell with his temper tantrums. Rarely anything in between. He did end up almost killing his career after the match.

“I thought that’s it,” he says. “I thought I would never win Wimbledon after this. It was a big blow; my career just went downwards after that. The reality of our sport is that no one cares about who came second best, no one remembers them.”

Fame was not what he craved though. “I was famous even before I won Wimbledon,” Ivanisevic says. “I was popular. People used to come to watch me, like they still do, because they knew I would say something, do something. They thought I was crazy, I only thought I was different.

“Before 2001, I was already having problems with my shoulder. So I was thinking, ‘Just give me one more chance.’”

Wimbledon stepped away from tradition and rather than awarding the wild card to a young and upcoming talent, they gave it to the 29-year-old, faded-out Ivanisevic. The charismatic Croat survived the first week, then in the second, beat Britain’s own Tim Henman in a rain-interrupted semi- final that was played over three days.

“Yes, I did think like fate was lining up,” he recalls. “I thought everything was happening for me ever since I won the second round (when he beat Moya). Then against Henman, I was two sets to one down when it started raining, I think it helped me. I was lucky to win that one.”

Ivanisevic had been on the verge of disintegrating when the heavens first opened up. He had won all of four points in the third set, which went 6-0 Henman’s way. Once they were back, the Croat dug himself out of the hole, and went on to win the match 7-5, 6-7, 0-6, 7-6, 6-3.

Rain proved his ally once again. The final was delayed to Monday, the tickets were given out at the turnstiles for £40 (around Rs.4,008). The Wimbledon final wasn’t an exclusive event open only to the royalty and celebrities any more. Almost 10,000 fans crammed into Centre Court. Against him was the universally liked and gifted serve-and-volleyer from Australia, Pat Rafter.

“It was a great final. It was played on a Monday. That will never happen again because the Centre Court now has a roof,” says Ivanisevic.

“But that was the people’s final and the atmosphere was nothing like I’ve seen at Wimbledon. I was playing against someone whom I really admired. He had already won two US Opens though, so I was thinking just let me win this one.”

Like it usually is when Ivanisevic is involved, it was a nerve-racking match. Both players struggled to handle the massive occasion, stamp their dominance. The Aussies were out with their inflatable kangaroo toys and big voices. Cricketers Shane Warne and Steve Waugh (who donned his baggy green), lent more weight to the Aussie support.

Ivanisevic and his box, with his father present, were letting emotions run over as the match veered towards its conclusion. On the last game, with Ivanisevic serving, he almost threatened to melt into a pool of tears.

“It was emotional for all of us,” says Ivanisevic. “Growing up, that is the only tournament I dreamed of.”

At 40-15, up two match points, he served two double faults. On the third, Rafter scored a winner. Ivanisevic crossed himself, sent a kiss to the heavens. The fourth, a 109 miles per hour (around 175km per hour) unreturnable second serve, finally did the job. After more than 3 hours, he had won 6-3, 3-6, 6-3, 2-6, 9-7, tugging at his fans’ hopes and fears along the way. Prone to expressing every single thing he felt on the court, Ivanisevic was one of the rare talents who reeled people in with his vulnerabilities. They felt his triumph as much as they had felt his heartache before. He was the people’s champion.

“Winning Wimbledon...I made peace with myself and everyone else.” “I didn’t care what I did after that,” he says, admitting that winning Wimbledon had quite possibly killed his ambition of wanting to win anything after. With the shoulder injury flaring up regularly, he finally quit in 2004.

Ivanisevic will return to London this month hoping to guide Cilic to a Wimbledon win, after having coached him to an unlikely victory at the 2014 US Open. Cilic, whose temperament is a polar opposite of his mentor’s, has the big serve that could well be trademarked by Croatia, but mainly controls the game from the baseline. Will we see a classic serve and volley player rise on the Wimbledon grass anytime soon?

“No,” says Ivanisevic. “The game has changed. No one plays serve and volley any more. They can’t win by playing serve and volley. But it doesn’t matter. Because Wimbledon will still be Wimbledon. There will be grass, there will be rain. People will still queue up overnight, they will eat strawberries. And whoever wins will be known as a Wimbledon champion forever, champion of the biggest tournament in our sport,” he says, before reflecting back on his unlikely victory.

“I won it when no one thought I would. I don’t know how to explain it...” he says, shrugging his broad shoulders. “But I don’t have to. Because I already did it.”

Federer’s tough love for Coric

Dubai: Borna Coric had been riding on a crest of good fortune all week. But the wave crashed for the lucky loser from Croatia as he came up against a bright and brilliant Roger Federer in the semifinals of the Dubai Open on Friday evening.

Federer, who has brought a game to match his orange neon tee in Dubai, romped to a 6-2, 6-1 victory in only 56 minutes to enter his ninth final here. He has won the ATP 500 event six times already and hasn’t been stretched for more than an hour in the four matches he has played so far.

For Coric, who was on a high after beating Andy Murray in the quarterfinals on Thursday, it was a reality check in big-boy tennis. Having beaten Rafael Nadal at the Swiss indoors in Basel last year, and the Murray victory here, Coric had said he had “literally nothing to lose” against Federer on Friday. And while he may have not lost much—making the semifinals after entering the main draw as a lucky loser was an achievement in itself—he learnt some valuable lessons from sharing court with the 17-time Grand Slam champion.

“I knew that it's going to be very tough.” Coric said after the match. “But when you come on the court and when you actually feel the ball and feel the pressure which he's making, it's actually been tougher than when you're watching it in the sofa in front of TV.”

“I was feeling yesterday like I won the Grand Slam, and then today I need to go out again after 24 hours and play against a guy who is ‐‐ we all know who he is. It's not easy, for sure. And also I was a little bit nervous with that, but I just need to be used to it,” he added.

Even though Federer rarely let up pressure on the youngster during the match, he was sympathetic towards the growing mound of expectations on Coric. The Croat is in the Novak Djokovic mould, an aggressive baseliner, and has had an eye-catching run in Dubai.

“I hope he's not going to be the next Novak,” the Swiss world no 2 said. “Don’t do that to him.”

“I believe he does actually play quite different, especially in terms of technique. Serve is totally different. But I do see what he means, you know. He's a bigger guy, probably same size and moves well off the baseline, especially towards the backhand side. Borna does a very good job.”

Angels, abroad

There's nothing more settling than hearing the strands of a familiar songs in an unfamiliar setting.

So, as I stood in the middle of the huge old town square of Prague, between the Astronomical clock tower and the Tyn church, trying not to be daunted by their scale and beauty, the well-known melody of Robbie Williams' 'Angels' floated through.

"Wherever it may take me, I know that life won't break me. I'm loving angels instead," sang the tall, thin guy with the long, untidy hair, sporting a leather jacket and a guitar that looked as worn out as his jeans. Struggling musician entertaining people in the heart of the city. Suddenly, Europe made sense again.

It is a regular feature in the continent. And as much as Europeans would have me believe, not every major European city looks the same. They call come with their own unique challenges and charms. Prague is not as big and difficult to navigate as Paris, a city it is regularly compared to: one of Prague's nicknames happens to be 'Paris of the East'. Despite the presence of a very Eiffelesque Petrin Tower in the castle district, this gem of old Europe is more compact and, in my opinion, more hauntingly beautiful than Paris.

The building and bridges that attract the most tourists look their age, which give the place a sense of character. Walking over the Charles Bridge, which I traversed six times in two-and-a-half days, never gets old. Every time you pass you are likely to see new details on the statues that stand imposingly on you. Angels and saints, in their stone set ways of hope, despair or wisdom, flank the way. Everything in old Prague is built to impress.

On my first evening in the city, I stood on the foot of the Charles Bridge as gazed at the Prague Castle perched on the hill, as the sunlight slowly leaked out of the sky and the artificial lights started illuminating the buildings. A did-you-know fact I later learned was that rock star Mick Jagger had financed the castle illumination. The Rolling Stone sure knows how to Shine a Light!

Charles Bridge and Castle district

I am not sure how long I stood there in wide-eyed awe, mesmerised by the lights and sight across the river from me. In the next couple of days, I saw the sight repeatedly, in postcards, on paintings and on magnets. It is one of the most enduring mental pictures you will ever take back.

The Czech are not an unfriendly lot. But they believe in speaking when spoken to, and even then very little. Whether they are naturally shy or have become habitually averse to hordes of tourists funnelling into their city is not clear, but they do take time warming up to you. As one of the tourist guides told us, "Don't judge them, they are tired of people running them over. It was the Nazis, then the communists and now tourists!"

A friendly voice amidst all that chaos, then for a solo traveler at least, feels like hot chocolate on a cold, rainy day. Groups of people huddled up in the square for some of that comforting warmth as he belted out the popular tunes. Some bobbed their head to rhythm, other lip-synched, still other frantically took pictures or shot videos. Occasionally, someone broke the circle and walked shyly towards the guitar case and dropped in some coins. He wrapped up the afternoon's work with Coldplay's 'Paradise': an ode to the escapist. In that moment, it felt good to be one.

By the old town square

Paes plays to the beat of passion

There is no one in Indian tennis, maybe even Indian sport, that electrifies and energises the crowd quite like Leander Paes.

Even on a day when he threatened to look his age, 41, Leander didn't let go of the passion and commitment that has seen him surmount many a difficult mountain. The deeper the match went, the bigger the point, the better he played. He charged up his teammate, Rohan Bopanna, and the 7,000-strong crowd at the KSLTA stadium to pull off an unlikely 1-6, 6-7, 6-3, 6-3, 8-6 win over a formidable doubles team of Nenad Zimonjic and Ilija Bozoljac.

It once again needed a super man effort for Leander to keep India's hopes hanging by the fingers in a tie that was headed for a 3-0 demolition on Saturday. And it was the kind of dig-deep victory that might well force Somdev Devvarman and Yuki Bhambri search deeper into their reserves to pull off a miracle in the reverse singles on Sunday.

Though the Serbs are also a patch-up team, they were a formidable pair, with perhaps the best modern-day combination in doubles: a doubles specialist and a sharp singles player with a big serve. They blitzed the Indians in the first set, breaking both Bopanna and Paes, winning the opener in 18 minutes.

The Indian pair put up a more solid show in the second set, stretching it into the tie-break despite losing serve early on. But the Serbs, built like bulls and who made the court shrink, came up with the goods to clinch it at four. Bozoljac, the youngest, least experienced and by far the lowest ranked player on court (227 to Zimonjic's 4, Paes' 35 and Bopanna's 27), was taking the attack to the Indians, setting up points with solid groundstrokes. Serbians really did not have a soft spot that the Indians could attack.

But at two sets and a break (2-3) down in the third set, something snapped. Zimonjic said he heard a click in the right side of his neck, the man was in pain. He called the trainer on the court, got it quickly treated, but was never the same player again.

The 38-year-old doubles veteran said the injury restricted his movement, he couldn't really turn his neck either side or look up to serve without feeling a stab of pain.

That was just the break the Indians were looking for to arrest the slide. Not only was Zimonjic not at his 100 per cent, but the injury timeout gave the hosts some time to re-gather their thoughts.
"Anand kept telling us, guys slow the game down, its all happening too fast," said Paes.
A quick break back was just the elixir of life that Paes/Bopanna and the downcast crowd at the stadium was looking for. As the Indian players were finally warmed up to the challenge, Paes pulled off some running volleys, and a backhand smash, that got the crowd going.

India won six games in a row, going from an almost out 2-3 in the third to 2-0 in the fourth to stun the Serbs. Even the solid Bozoljac, who tried to do his best to carry the team with some stunning down-the-line returns, cracked.

"I am still trying to figure out how we lost that match; we had it in the pocket," a bemused and shocked 'Bozo' said at the media conference.
"I keep replaying the match in my mind and I still don't know how we lost. I don't know what happened there."

What happened was Leander Paes. His crowd, their hero. It was a match even more formidable rivals have found difficult to resist. Paes' ability, even when constricted with a pedestrian serve and a slowing body, to turn up for the big matches and big points is peerless. Bozoljac, who along with Zimonjic earned the biggest scalp in doubles by beating the Bryans in the Davis Cup last year, just didn't see it coming.

He also had with him a partner who was ready to ride the wave. As Leander's presence grew in the arena, so did Bopanna's confidence. He stopped fluffing the easy volleys and started sending down serves that have earned the nickname 'Bofors Bopanna'.

The Serbians did put up a more solid performance in the fifth set, but something had already snapped and the momentum had swung so much in India's favour that there was going to be just one result. A happy finish for India.

How India lost out on the home advantage

Players love to remind the media that hindsight is a good thing.

But even before Yuki Bhambri and Somdev Devvarman put up an uninspiring (baffling in Bhambri's case) show on the first day of the Davis Cup World Group tie against Serbia, there was unease at the conditions we were making them play in.

With the younger generation of tennis players not comfortable with putting on their grass shoes, the one big ace up India's sleeve to seize that home advantage is the weather. And the tennis federation didn't really make the best use of it by having the tie in Bangalore, which at this time of the year is much cooler and less humid than other major cities with tennis courts (namely Chennai). To top it, the Indian agreed for at afternoon start which means the Serbians would not really be pushed out of their comfort zone weather-wise, especially in the second match of the day that started in the evening and was played out under lights.

Also India deluding themselves that the altitude would have worked in their favour was brutally exposed. The Indian players, especially the singles lot, is not any more used to playing at an altitude than the Serbians. The only Davis Cup tie they have played in Bangalore before was the one against Indonesia, and that is hardly a yardstick.

Bhambri especially looked unable to read or control the flying ball: the result of which was 59 unforced errors, a majority of them on his dominant forehand side. The 22-year-old didn't just have a bad day, he had a day that raise major doubts about his tactical flexibility and mental staying power.
"When we made the decision to have the tie in Bangalore we did not know that Novak Djokovic would not come, or (Janko) Tipsarevic would not come," replied Somdev Devvarman in defence. "We made a decision that looked the best under those circumstances."

In fairness, Somdev has performed well in tournaments that are played in these conditions, especially the one in Johannesburg. But Serbia adapted admirably to the challenge and turned in two nerveless performances. They chose their spots and hit them with clinical precision. No frills. Though they were amply helped by Somdev and Yuki's inability to stay hit deep or come up with any sort of alternative game plan, the young Serbs' superiority was kind of overwhelming.

Mathematically, at least, the tie is not over yet and the doubles rubber today between Leander Paes/Rohan Bopanna and Nenad Zimonjic/Ilija Bozoljac promises to be a more even contest.
Somdev also believes that the reverse singles with be much better match-ups for him as well as Yuki. But the assurance with which Serbia's No 4 and 5 played against India's best talent makes the hope for a miracle a hollow occupation.