Future of Pakistan Tennis and that man Kirsten

The future of Pakistan tennis is Nofil Kaleem. This was stated by PTF officials the other day. The young fourteen year old has been playing the Asian Tennis Federation Under-14 circuit and has amassed enough points to become the top ranked Under-14 player on the Asian circuit. Nofil was followed closely in the rankings by Eric Alvarez of the Philippines with Chan Oh of Korea third.
Nofil earned 1150 ranking points after playing in nine tournaments. Alvarez had 965 points in three tournaments with Oh getting 960 points in the one tournament he played. Pakistan’s Mohammad Ali Sahibzada was at 59th position with 230 points from two tournaments. Abdaal Haider another Pakistani had 189 points from three tournaments for 71st position. This performance is certainly to be complimented.
It is encouraging to see that young Nofil has committed himself to the sport. He is studying privately and spends morning and evening at the courts with his coach who also travels with Nofil wherever he goes. This is the right way to go about for making tennis a career and one wishes the youngster all the best.
He is fortunate in having an exclusive sponsorship arrangement with a bank which enables him to travel, train and compete along with his coach.
The PTF and especially President Kaleem Imam deserve credit for this initiative. It is hoped that this will set a precedent and other talented players will be afforded the same opportunity to realize their potential.
Meanwhile Pakistan’s Davis Cup campaign will kick off in February with a tie against Sri Lanka.
For this purpose, trials have been announced for early December. With Aisam Qureshi and Aqeel Khan automatically selected, Mohammad Abid, Heera Ashiq and Yasser Khan look to be the other players vying for the remaining two positions. Two of Pakistan’s best young players Samir Iftekhar and Abid Akbar are in the USA playing college tennis. Unfortunately, they cannot get away from their University commitments until December 25 and will miss the trials.
PTF office antics
The PTF must have a very good reason to exclude these players from the trials especially when they knew of the players’ availability window. These two players are playing a very high standard of tennis, beating world class players. Samir reached the finals of the NCAA regional qualifiers while Abid qualified among the top twenty doubles teams in American college tennis.
At the NCAA Indoor Nationals, Abid defeated the team from the four-time national champion University of Southern California team as well as a top Columbia University team. Abid had played tournaments in Pakistan in the summer, comfortably defeating all the other youngsters and giving Aqeel Khan a tough time. Both players are twenty or twenty one and should be considered, along with Nofil, to have a future in Pakistan tennis if not a “present”!
An ITF Coaching Course was held in Islamabad recently.
About twenty coaches or would-be coaches attended. By all accounts it was a successful, happy experience for all. There were though some complaints of deserving people being ignored while inexperienced friends of the PTF office were accommodated. One of those left out was a former national champion of international coaching experience. Other players who had registered but were in the bad books of the PTF office, were ignored as well. The PTF high command has been alerted by this column of the presence in PTF of illegal, unqualified people who control everything.
They try to keep the tennis level low just so that they are not overshadowed. They have made a career out of tennis politics and ingratiate the high command in many ways just to fulfill their own agenda. This is exactly what is happening again and could cause a lot of embarrassment for the high command as well as harm the cause of tennis.
Valiant du Plessis
Australia missed a golden opportunity to win the second Test, where Faf du Plessis foiled them with a valiant rear guard action. The momentum and the whole series turned on that innings. Even though Australia made inroads into South Africa’s first innings in the Perth Test at the WACA, it was du Plessis again who dragged his side to a reasonable score. It was then all Dale Steyn, Morkel and co who bowled some superb spells on the responsive WACA track to reduce Australia to 160 odd. But the way South Africa ran away with the second innings, scoring at ODI rates, with Smith, Amla and De Villiers making light of the Aussie bowlers, makes them deserved holders of the number one ranking.
And behind this new found self belief there is that man again, Gary Kirsten. Kirsten has done for South Africa what he had done earlier for India, instilled self belief, the one facet that was lacking in the Proteas. He must surely be the most valuable coaching commodity on the cricketing circuit.
Captain Cook, India’s nemesis
India’s cricketers had been hoping for an easy outing against England and certainly, after winning the first Test easily, could have been forgiven the thought. But England, led by Captain Cook, have, like the South Africans, completely turned the momentum around. Having won the second Test, England dominated the third, as Monty Panesar again proved to be the star along with pacer James Anderson. But it is the inevitability of Cook’s batting that took all the fizz out of India. With hundreds in each Test, he has led from the front.
Cook possesses a simple, basic, technique that makes batting look the easiest thing in the world. He combines that with a steady temperament so calm that it is difficult to tell whether he is batting on 1 or on 201. Surely, Cook is the class batting act of world cricket, along with, perhaps, Hashim Amla.
Pakistan are third!
Pakistan have shocked world number one Germany in the Champions’ Trophy, were given a thrashing in the semi by the Netherlands. But the win against Germany was an outstanding result, one that few expected. Shakeel Abbasi led the way after Germany had taken the lead. And then Pakistan beat arch-rival India to finish third. Not a bad effort Down Under. Hope it would be sustained by the green shirts in the forthcoming events.