The schools of Dehradun have excellent infrastructure facilities for a sports like tennis and with proper coaching many good players can come up from here. Former India international and Chief Executive Officer of Mahesh Bhupati Tennis Academy (MBTA) Gaurav Natekar opined this while addressing media persons on Friday.
The former tennis ace was in the State capital as part of a tie-up between prestigious Mussoorie International School (MIS) and MBTA. Natekar said that nowadays many quality players are springing up from small towns due to increase in sporting facilities.
He said that though the infrastructure facilities have sprang up in many areas the sports like tennis needs good coaches. Natekar was of the view that media should support sports other than cricket more than it is currently doing.
Giving an example he said that Saina Nehwal started getting prominent coverage only after she attained world number one ranking. About the association with MIS, the CEO of MBTA said that talent of students would be nurtured by the academy.
“Our academy strongly believes in identifying and nurturing talent from the grass root level to mould them into sport champions. We are look forward to working with the talented girls at MIS and inculcating in them, through our tennis program, strong values such as team work, discipline, dedication and the ability to handle success and failure. All of these qualities will help turning them into strong, smart, successful and upright citizens of India,” he said.
The Principal of MIS, Priaa Peter said that the girls of the schools would be immensely benefited by the association of MBTA and hoped that school would produce quality players in near future.
MBTA will conduct the ‘Progressive Tennis program’ for the students of school belonging to the age group of 4 to 9 years that will enable them to learn the sport with specialized equipment and later progress them to full sized courts at the right time.