India tennis star Yuki Bhambri could miss the upcoming Davis Cup tie against Korea in Seoul. Bhambri suffered a leg strain ahead of the US Open during practice.
He did participate in the US Open alongside Anirudh Chandrasekar; however, the pair lost in the first round. Bhambri did not travel to Seoul with the first batch of the Indian squad, raising doubts if he’d be fit to play in the competition. The event is of utmost importance as the winner will seal a place in the elite 8-team Davis Cup finals.
Following his injury, Bhambri had termed the injury minor and said that there was no threat to his Asian Games participation later this month. Bhambri is being monitored on a day-to-day basis and is consulting the Indian Davis Cup team support staff, including Debashish Das and Yash Pandey, to assess his recovery.
“This happened before the main draw match during practice. This is a minor strain. There is no timeline set for my recovery but there is nothing major,” Bhambri told PTI.
There is still pain. It’s a day-by-day situation; we will see how it goes,” he said.
“I am competing in the Asian Games one hundred percent. We will see if we can recover for Davis Cup,” he said.
If Bhambri fails to make the Davis Cup squad, India will have to try alternative combinations, with N Sriram Balaji and singles specialist Dhakshineswar Suresh a possible combination among the options.
Siddharth Rawat and Arnav Paparkar are reserve players in the squad, however, they don’t have much experience in the doubles category.
According to AITA sources, left-handed Anirudh Chandrasekar has already been asked to link up with the squad in Seoul as per captain Rohit Rajpal’s request. He already has a Korea visa.
AITA has also applied for a visa for Niki Poonacha.
“We are good enough to beat Korea in doubles and there is no dearth of doubles options in India,” said Bhambri.