Prajnesh, Ramkumar need to believe in their ability: Bhupathi

TIL Desk Sports/ Indian tennis legend Mahesh Bhupathi, who is the non-playing captain of the Davis Cup team to take on Italy in the World Group qualifiers, has high hopes from his singles’ players Prajnesh Gunneswaran and Ramkumar Ramanthan.

“We are not focused on the doubles. We obviously have to win three points to win the match. So singles are as important as the doubles for us,” Bhupathi told. Both Prajnesh and Ramkumar have had a good 2018 and fancy their chances on grass, which was the principal reason Bhupathi chose to play here at the Calcutta South Club.

Against higher-ranked Italians, India are expected to bank heavily on the experienced Rohan Bopanna and Divij Sharan with the Jakarta Asian Games gold medal-winning Indian doubles pair also winning at the Pune ATP earlier this month. But Bhupathi stressed if Prajnesh and Ramkumar can “believe in their ability” and rekindle the same form, anything is possible.