A strong spell of rain overnight could not disturb the training schedule of the Indian team, preparing for the Davis Cup tie against Denmark on the grass courts at the Gymkhana Club on Saturday.
Captain Rohit Rajpal, quite occupied with the organisation of the tie, handling the logistics on many fronts, was quick to call the ground staff on Friday night to get the two practice courts covered with tarpaulin.
‘’We wanted to water the centre court, so did not have to cover it. The rain will do good to the grass’’, observed Rohit, understandably happy to keep things under control. He was all praise for the administrator of the Gymkhana Club, Om Pathak, for stepping up the machinery in the best possible way.
Rigorous workout
Rohan Bopanna opted to take a day of rest, while the rest of the team assembled in strength in the afternoon for a rigorous work out.
Ramkumar Ramanathan, Prajnesh Gunneswaran and Yuki Bhambri had drills on court along with Saketh Myneni and Digvijay Pratap Singh, as coach M. Balachandran put them through the course, in an interesting way.
Professional approach
All the three singles players Ramkumar, Prajnesh and Yuki were sharp on the grass courts. The captain remarked that not only the three, but all the players were quite professional and had their grass court shoes ready for training, even though they rarely play on grass the whole season.
Coach Zeeshan Ali kept Divij Sharan, Niki Poonacha, Karan Singh and Chirag Duhan occupied with doubles training on the other court, under a bright sun.
The Denmark team was scheduled to arrive in the early hours of Sunday, and has sought training in the afternoon.
‘’The Denmark team will also train at the Gymkhana Club courts from tomorrow’’, said Col. Ranbir Chauhan.
