Pandemic impact: Soaring prices, shrinking pockets for Indian tennis gamers

A cool GBP 8,500 (INR 8.75 lakh) in prize cash is handed over to the participant who loses within the first spherical of Wimbledon’s qualifiers. Two Indians, Prajnesh Gunneswaran and Ankita Raina obtained that pay-check. The third Indian within the qualifiers managed to get to the third spherical, and for his efforts Ramkumar Ramanathan obtained GBP 25,500 (over INR 26 lakh).
The truth stays although that other than these three, and Sumit Nagal who skipped Wimbledon this yr, there aren’t some other Indians ranked excessive sufficient to compete within the high-prize cash singles occasions – the Grand Slams being the top.
To put the prize cash into perspective, contemplate that the primary spherical qualifier will get INR 8.75 lakh. James Duckworth, who received the 2019 ATP Challenger in Pune, received USD 7,200 (INR 5.34 lakh) as prize cash.
For athletes on the whole, not to mention tennis gamers, the menacing cloud of Covid-19 has elevated the price of travelling. And for gamers competing within the decrease leagues the place prize cash is just not as rewarding, the added prices have turn into tedious.
For the primary time since final September, Sasikumar Mukund obtained to play in the principle draw of an ATP Challenger occasion earlier this month. But he needed to shell out round INR 15,000 greater than what he would have spent pre-pandemic to buy the ticket from his base in Vienna to Little Rock, Arkansas within the United States. An costly journey, although not essentially as a result of ticket costs have gone up. Instead it’s as a result of cheaper routes have both been stopped or are not viable resulting from journey restrictions.
“Connections have decreased. To get to a certain place, back then you’d have 10 different airlines with the same connection, now you have maybe two,” 24-year-old Mukund says, who paid over INR 50,000 to compete on the two Challengers within the US the place he earned round INR 1 lakh.
It isn’t simply the value of tickets going up that’s inflicting the pinch although.
“The main thing now is you’re not making the same money now. The prices have changed by maybe a few thousands, but now you’re not getting that many tournaments to play in,” Mukund, now ranked 319, provides.
Since the pandemic, tournaments all over the world have needed to cancel. The total Asian Challenger swing, which is mostly a haven for Indian gamers (significantly the Challengers in Pune, Chennai and Bangalore) resulting from decrease journey prices, took a beating final yr, and possibly will do that yr too.
No play, no pay
The greater ranges of tennis have confronted prize cash cuts – Novak Djokovic obtained a cheque of 1.4 million Euros for profitable the French Open this yr in comparison with the 1.6 million Euros Rafael Nadal pocketed final yr. At the decrease ranges, there hasn’t been a change in prize cash, however the discount in tournaments have made it more durable for gamers to get an entry into those that happen – in Europe and the Americas.
The common RT-PCR exams too are an costly proposition. “I understand the tests are a bit cheaper in India (around INR 1500 to 2000). In Europe it’s around 70 Euros on average (around INR 6200),” says Prajnesh, a former World No 75 now ranked 148.
And then there are the journey restrictions the place a slip-up could cause quite a lot of bother, as Prajnesh came upon.
On his technique to Nur-Sultan, Kazakhstan from South Africa, by way of Istanbul, the 31-year-old misinterpret journey necessities – the take a look at wanted to be achieved 72 hours earlier than arrival and never departure. Once in Turkey, he wasn’t allowed to board the flight to Kazakhstan since he missed the cut-off by 4 hours. Instead he needed to fly to Albania, take a take a look at, keep on the lodge in a single day, fly to Istanbul, then Minsk (Belarus) and eventually Kazakhstan.
“The trip should have cost just a lakh for my wife and I, instead we ended up spending around INR 3 lakh.”
To keep away from such an issue Mukund took the costly journey from Vienna to the US, fairly than the cheaper (by about INR 15,000) possibility from Munich. Additionally, day-after-day spent overseas (for tennis and quarantine) prices round INR 10,000 as per Prajnesh and Mukund’s estimate.
Yet these are the issues going through gamers who really managed to go overseas. A bunch of Indian tennis gamers are presently ‘stuck’ in India. “I was trying to go for an event in France (WTA 125, Saint-Malo in May). I would have made the doubles cut and might have gotten into the singles qualifying rounds,” says Rutuja Bhosale, ranked 450, who has been grounded in Pune because the second lockdown began in April. “The French government was issuing some kind of a waiver for athletes, but a week before I was expected to leave they said they cannot do that for Indians.”
World No 546 Sidharth Rawat, who examined optimistic final month for the virus alongside along with his total household, too has been grounded in India. He had harboured hopes of getting an opportunity at a sequence of Challengers in Kazakhstan in June and July. That hope has been dashed as organisers “confirmed that Indians are not allowed to travel to the country.”
Rawat, 28, who has earned a complete prize cash of USD 72,094 (round INR 53 lakhs) since taking part in his first ever occasion in 2011, and simply USD 1,476 (virtually INR 1.1 lakh) this yr, is not sure how lengthy he can pursue the game. Since the pandemic began final yr, he’s been finding out in direction of the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) – civil companies. The examinations have been scheduled for June, however have now been postponed to October.
“(If I pass) I’ll have to look at how the tennis is going. If I’m improving or if things aren’t getting better,” Rawat says. “For all my heart, I want tennis to work. I want to play more.”