Leander Paes has been down a few times in life, but never out. The strong desire to fulfil ambitions and the ability to look at the brighter side have pulled him through many a mental and physical crisis. Look at the present, for instance. Rudely jolted and pushed to a corner by a players’ revolt, Paes showed some defiance before putting his hands up. His captaincy was unacceptable to his Davis Cup teammates and he had to resign.

New Delhi: Carrying the hopes of a billion people is a ‘privilege’ for Sania Mirza and the Hyderabadi tennis ace vows to give everything it needs to bring home an individual Olympic medal, a feat only four Indians have managed since independence.

Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi are trying to be fourth-time lucky in the Olympic Games.

“We had a very good work-out. The preparation has been great. Both of us reached the semifinals of Cincinnatti. We would have trained in Los Angeles only if we had not done well in the last tournament.

MIAMI, where the stars dazzle under a moonlit sky and the sea waves whip up a fantasy. An urgent nudge from a fellow journalist from Panama woke me from my reverie. Not that I could complain. There was in the flesh, Anna Kournikova, the perennial glamour girl of tennis in a little black dress, flushed with dancing, blond hair flying in the cool breeze as she gasped for “my Bombay Sapphire”! The drama had just about begun to unfold at the hip nightclub, Opium, the venue of glitz, glamour and sexy backs.