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India’s second highest ranked singles star – Sumit Nagal recently spoke about bring back former Davis Cup captain Mahesh Bhupathi back. The association appointed former Davis Cupper Rohit Rajpal to replace Bhupathi as India’s non-playing captain after he refused to travel to Islamabad for the November 29-30 Davis Cup tie against Pakistan.
But even after the ITF shifted the tie to a neutral venue, AITA still chose to stick with Rajpal as the non-playing captain. “I hope AITA changes things around and get Bhupathi back. Right now they’re saying that it Rohit Rajpal as captain is for this tie.
I hope things are different next year after the tie,” said Nagal. ““Since Mahesh came in, he has made it a team. We do not make individual decisions now. He asks us, we speak up and then we decide as a Davis Cup group”.
He further added, “He has created a WhatsApp group where he talks to each one of us about our game, scheduling or anything else. Ask any player whether Mahesh is involved and he will say yes. He is using his private time to help Indian tennis.
He doesn’t have to answer our calls at 6am and help us with our game when he is only called up for Davis Cup duty. But he still does it,” Ramkumar also praised Bhupathi, saying, “He told me to focus on my returns and to go more at the net.
Just small things like these make a lot of difference. Mahesh was constantly teaching new things when he was with us at the Davis Cup, and is someone who has always been there for me”.