Leander PaesAknows and believes that the entire Indian Olympic team has worked stupendously hard to prepare for the prestigious event.
He said in an interview, “If you look at the Indian Olympics as a contingent, it has been a difficult outing for us. Since 1996 to now, we had quite a few individuals that came up and won a medal. This year has been much harder for us. The competition has been much difficult’ He further added ‘The whole Indian contingent has worked really hard this year to prepare for the Olympics. Playing against the best in any discipline at the Olympics, you realize how tough the competition is.”
The 43 year old who is regarded as one of the best mixed doubles and doubles players of all time was knocked out in the very first round. Paes and his partner Rohan Bopanna were demolished in straight sets, but then again that was to be expected. Paes had arrived a day before and thus had no practices time or even time to get used to the conditions in Rio. He is one of the most successful Indian tennis players but this is nonsense, one does not arrive one day before an Olympic match when players like Andy Murray and world number one Novak Djokovic arrived one week earlier.
The man himself said, ‘For me to go out there, enjoy my tennis and earn a living through it is important. So, now that the Olympics are done for me, I am preparing for the US Open,’ He further added ‘For me, I am preparing for the US Open. I have been working hard to get to number 20. I am at 18th at the moment. I love my tennis. I love to play and thats why I go to smaller tournaments and work my ranking up, especially this year as it has been difficult for me personally.’
Rahul Bopanna and Sania Mirza play the loser of the match between the American duo ofAJack Sock-Bethanie Mattek-Sands and the Czech Republican teamAof Radek Stepanek-Lucie Hradecka in the bronze medal playoff.
