The success of 15-year-old Rutuja Bhosale becoming the youngest player to win the senior tennis nationals, 17-year-old Arjun Kadhe lifting a grand double crown winning the boys under 18 championships and the senior national doubles title partnering senior player Nitten Kirrtane, Pratharna Thombare wining the girls’ doubles title along with Namita Bal cannot be termed as a fluke, but a result of a well planned programme going on for the last five years.
The success of the players all members of the MSLTA Vision Programme and the Bharat Forge - Lakshya programme goes to prove that with proper planning, coordination and goal setting players can surely take players to the top .
The Vision programme was devised by the Maharashtra State Lawn Tennis Association (MSLTA) in 2006 to help players from
Under the programme the MSLTA would take care of the travel and training. Besides, the body will also use techniques like bio-mechanical analysis, monitoring using videos, etc. thus profiling the players. With an eye on the future, the body also zeroed in on younger players so as to create the next batch of players to be brought under this programme.
The best part of the programme was that the players could play with their own coaches throughout the year but would have to assemble as a group every quarter for periodical on court and off court tests. Currently players train at different centres in Pune. While Rutuja and Sahil train with former Davis Cupper Sandeep Kirtane, Arjun trains with Hemant Bendrey and Prarthana Tombare trains with Davis Cup coach Nandan Bal.
Dr. Vece Paes, father of legendary Leander, was bought in two years ago by MSLTA to play the role of the peak performance trainer, while the association signed up with Sports Mechanics for the bio mechanical video programming.
The entire programme received a boost when Bharat Forge Limited, a global forging conglomerate and Lakshya, a city based sports NGO joined hands to support young talent and upcoming sportspersons.
Lakshya which supports players in chess, boxing, wrestling, table tennis apart from cricket decided to take Bharat Forge help to sponsor five young and country’s top junior tennis players Ankita Raina, Arjun Kadhe, Pratharna Thombare, Rutuja Bhosale and Sahil Deshmukh, says Sunder Iyer, secretary of Lakshya and also the treasurer of MSLTA.
Baba Kalyani, Chairman and Managing Director, Bharat Forge Ltd, says “It is sponsorships such as these, I believe which go a long way in contributing to the development of these young sports talent and also encourage them on the demanding path to the top.
Adds Iyer , when we selected players under this programme two year ago the five selected players were top three players in their respective age groups, while 16year old Ankita Raina basically from Ahmedabad having shifted base to Pune won the senior national women’s championships in 2009 , Arjun Kadhe, a Pune boy was No.1 in the Boys under 16 event , while Pratharna Thombare from Barshi in Solapur was Girls under 16 No1 , Rutuja Bhosale was No 3 in the Girls under 14, while Sahil Deshmukh from Pune was ranked No 1 in the Boys under 12 event.
A Press release
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