Chetan needs a double helping

Vimal8217;s problems have been aggravated by the fact that Arvind Bhatt, who till recently the second singles player by virtue of his ranking, has now been relegated to third. Anup Sridhar has climbed up the rankings to 57, with Bhatt at 63. With Sanave out, the first doubles combination has been decided with V Diju, who formed the second specialist pair with Jaseel P Ismail, now pairing up with Sanave8217;s partner Rupesh Kumar.

In such a scenario, one of the singles players will now have to come in to partner Ismail for the second doubles. Bhatt8217;s case is stronger since he has played more doubles than Anand, but playing the third singles means he will not have time between the matches which Anand will, given that he will be playing the first singles.

Anand, though, is yet to get a feel of doubles. 8220;I have not played competitive doubles for quite some time now and so I am not getting the feel of it at the moment. But, there8217;s still about a week to go in the camp and I am hoping to get it right,8221; he said.

Both coach and his star player, however, feel that the issue with Germany should be dealt with in singles itself. 8220;We will have to pull out all the singles against Germany. Their two combinations are ranked 18th and 19th and so if the tie goes down to doubles, it could get a bit dicey,8221; Anand said.

As for Vimal, he is hoping that beating Germany will open up a host of possibilities.

8220;We play China on April 28 and then Germany, one that if we win, will open the door to the quarter-finals since we should beat New Zealand who we will play next,8221; he said.