New Delhi, December 20 (PTI) The lack of depth in Indian tennis is due to the lack of a structured program, Davis Cup captain Rohit Rajpal said on Monday, but along with coach Zeeshan Ali, was optimistic that the formation would take place of the National Tennis Center will soon begin producing players who will advance the game.

The NTC has started work with the Delhi Lawn Tennis Association (DLTA) but is raising funds for the ambitious project that provides scholarships to top young players and aims to provide state-of-the-art training facilities to the best Indian players he is the national association AITA.

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India doesn’t have a single top 100 individual player and the top ranked player is 27-year-old Ramkumar Ramanathan, who is at number 184 on the ATP charts. Prajnesh Gunneswaran, 32, is not getting any younger and Rohan Bopanna has already reached 41.

Yuki Bhambri, 29, lost valuable time due to injuries and 24-year-old Sumit Nagal also has his own limits.

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Right now, the next Davis Cup players are nowhere to be seen.

Even among Asians, India does not have a single young player in the top 5. At 97 years old, Nishant Dabas is the only player among the top 100 juniors in the world. Players from Namibia, Morocco, Kazkahstan and Brazil are way ahead of the Indians.

“We have to do something. It’s a worrying situation. At least in Asia we used to dominate, but that’s no longer the case. That’s because a structured program is missing,” rowed Rajpal, who was there at the start of the second season the professional tennis league.

“But now NTC is here. A consistent pipeline is a necessity, something that badminton has done is needed for tennis.”

Zeeshan, who heads the NTC’s coaching program, said “nothing happens overnight”. Zeeshan left his Bangalore base and moved his family to Noida to run the NTC.

“The aim of the NTC is not just to train the youngsters, but to create a base for all of the country’s top players to use the facilities,” said Zeshan.

“The physios, the fitness trainers, the gym, the pool, the restaurant and, above all, a sports science center in which the players and their injury problems can be scientifically approached.”

With immediate effect, the NTC has taken Karan Singh, Ajay Malik, Nishant Dabas, Riya Sachdeva (U14) under its wing and taken over all costs for training and stay at DLTA.

Suraj Prabodh and Nitin Sinha have also made NTC their base, with around 35 players, including from Singapore and the Middle East, now training at the center.

NTC will also partner with Open Schools to teach its trainees online so that their training does not suffer.

“We have lost a lot of players to the US college system. I’m sure that if given the choice, players would rather go pro than play college tennis. And 70-80 percent of Indian players can can’t afford to train in Spain. ” or Germany.

“We’re trying to fill the gap. For the first time we have a program and hopefully it will make a difference,” said Rajpal.

(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from the Syndicated News Feed. LatestLY Staff may not have changed or edited the content.)