Former India tennis ace Vijay Amritraj is confident that the men’s singles final at Wimbledon will be a repeat of last year, between Spain’s two-time defending champion Carlos Alcaraz, fresh off a second title at the French Open in June, and Serbia’s 24-time Grand Slam-winner Novak Djokovic. Amritraj, 71, also believes this is Djokovic’s best chance to claim that elusive 25th Grand Slam title.
“The best shot Djokovic has against Alcaraz and [Jannik] Sinner is on this surface [grass]. Most of the predictions here from my fellow players of the past have pretty much focused on a Djokovic-Alcaraz final. Djokovic is clearly a challenger alongside [Jannik] Sinner and Alcaraz. These three guys seem to be the frontrunners, but upsets can happen — more likely in the Djokovic-Sinner situation rather than in the Alcaraz situation,” Amritraj, who represented India from 1970 to 1993, told mid-day during an online media interaction organised by JioStar.
For the women’s draw, though, the competition is very close, he felt. “Amongst the women, in the last eight years, we have had eight different winners. And, we know for a fact this year is going to be a ninth as [defending champion] Barbora Krejcikova has already lost. That shows the depth of women’s tennis and that everyone is pretty close to each other. So, predictions in the women, I think it’s still down to World No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka,” added Amritraj.
Meanwhile, on the Indian front, the skies are grey. Amritraj, who won 15 singles titles in his career and had a peak ranking of World No. 18 in 1980, minced no words when asked about the possibility of seeing an Indian compete for a Grand Slam singles title in future. “We have a long way to go. The important aspect is focusing on your career and where you want to be. If you want to be the next [Roger] Federer or [Rafael] Nadal or Djokovic, it’s important that the work ethic completely transcends everything we are doing at this point. The focus needs to be entirely on singles and the fact remains that we don’t have anyone in the top 100. So, unless we get players in the top 100, then [top] 50 and [top] 20, we cannot start looking at winning major tournaments,” Amritraj signed off.
