Aces High

“I am thrilled with the way I played throughout the week. It is my first big title of the year after I lost in the ITF Future’s Tournament at Phnom Penh at Cambodia. It feels good to return to winning ways,” said Vishnu,23,after defeating second seed Yuki Bhambri of New Delhi,4-6,7-5,6-3,in the final of the tournament.

What made the victory even sweeter was the fact that Vishnu was staring at defeat,dropping the first set and trailed Yuki 2-3 in the second set,but staged a great comeback to win the set at 7-5 against a struggling Yuki,who looked in discomfort after aggravating the ankle injury. “Yuki is an exceptional player and I have always loved playing against him. I had never beaten him in a final and he was playing really well in the first two sets. I am happy that my service,which I had been working on for a long time,pulled me out of trouble on couple of occassions,” Vishnu,who also won the doubles title after partnering Divij Sharan,shared.

More matches

DESPITE starting his professional career five years ago,Vishnu hardly saw any success in the first four years,ending the ATP ranking at 888 in 2008 from 995 in 2005- an improvement of only 107 places. However,2009 was his breakthrough year,winning his first ITF Future’s title and a jump of 497 places to 397 ranking.

“It has been a mixed journey so far. I was not travelling much,and on top of that I faced some financial problems. But the Andhra government provided me a helping hand and I have been travelling more in the last three years and my improvement in ranking is due to that. I played 17 tournaments last year and I have kept the tournaments at 22 this year. I am looking forward to improve my ATP ranking now,” asserted Vishnu,currently ranked 369 in the world.

Being the third highest ranked Indian player on the ATP charts,Vishnu knows there is still plenty of work to finish before he can reach where his contemporary Somdev Devvarman is standing today.

“I was the second highest ranked player last year but Karan (Rastogi) played some great tennis and leap-frogged me. Though there are no good players in ITF Futures tournament,I always look forward to play it to improve my ATP rankings. And I try to mix ITF tournaments with ATP Challengers. After the ITF Futures tournaments in Noida and Chennai in the next two weeks,I will play ATP Challenger Tour in Busan (South Korea) and Fergana (Uzbekistan). I want to move into the world Top 350 players and for that I need to play more tournaments. And since more tournaments means more stress on the body,I am working on my fitness and keeping myself ready for the challenges,” the Hyderabad lad,who learnt the basics from CV Nagaraj at School of Power Tennis Academy who learnt the basics from C.V. Nagaraj at School of Power Tennis Academy (Secunderabad).