Road to Rio: India's duo of best players, Sania Mirza and Rohan Bopanna, are strong Olympic medal hopes

Name: Sania Mirza and Rohan Bopanna

Age: 29 and 36

Discipline: Tennis

Category: Mixed Doubles

Qualification: Sania is ranked number one in the world in women’s doubles and Bopanna finished in the top 10 of the ATP Doubles Rankings in June 2016 to seal a berth for India.

Strengths: Sania is one half of the highest ranked pair in women’s doubles and admittedly India’s best tennis player. She has evolved her game to be better suited for doubles, and together with Bopanna, who has always performed better in doubles, makes a solid pair.

Past Olympic performance: Sania has represented India at two Olympics before Rio – 2008 Beijing and 2012 London. In 2008, she retired from her singles match in the first round because of a right wrist injury. In the doubles, she  and her partner Sunitha Rao got a walkover in the first round but lost in the second round. In 2012, she lost in the first round of women’s doubles with Rushmi Chakravarthy and bowed out in quarterfinals of mixed doubles with Leander Paes.

Past record: Sania Mirza is currently the world number one in doubles and has won 37 career doubles titles including six Grand Slam (three each in women’s doubles and in mixed doubles.)  She has also won a total of 14 medals, including six gold, at multi-sport events such as the Asian Games, the Commonwealth Games and the Afro-Asian Games.

- Bopanna is currently among the best doubles players, with a highest ranking of three in 2013. He has 14 doubles career title and was the runner up, along with Aisam-ul-haq-Qureshi at 2010 US Open, his best performance at a Grand Slam.

Rio Prospects: In Sania’s own words, mixed doubles is India’s best be t for a tennis medal at the 2016 Olympics, and rightly so because they are the highest ranked Indians in the sport and have been on top of their game of late. While they will face some of the best in the sport at Rio, both Sania and Bopanna have the potential to beat the big names and grab a medal.

This is not the first Olympics for either of the two, but Rio 2016 will be the best medal chance for the Indian mixed doubles pair of Sania Mirza and Rohan Bopanna. Both of them are at the top of the game, recent form notwithstanding, and have played together enough to have established a good rapport. Not to mention, they also have a point to prove, after the controversy surrounding the Olympic selections in the past.

Back in 2012, the mixed doubles pair to represent India – Sania Mirza and Leander Paes – were forced to play together as a compromise, since Paes had to settle for playing men’s doubles with Vishnu Vardhan. She had then accused the AITA of ‘using her as bait for Paes’ in an interview with Times of India , after both Bopanna and Mahesh Bhupathi had refused to play with him. This time though, Sania is the higher ranks player and has the clout to choose her partner. She had “conveyed” her decision to AITA top brass about her preferred mixed doubles partner at the Rio Games back in June. With the veteran Paes being out of the picture, the pair will want to justify this and prove their point with a good performance.

Both Sania and Bopanna have experience aplenty on the tour, especially in doubles. Their success on the doubles circuit – Sania is world number one and Bopanna has been ranked as high as third – and inherent ability, make it a potential world-class partnership.  Sania is no stranger to playing and winning mixed doubles for India with multiple partners – she won the mixed doubles gold at the 2006 Asian Games with Leander Paes and at the 2014 Asian Games with Saketh Myneni as well as the silver at the 2010 Asian Games with Vishnu Vardhan and a bronze at the 2002 Asian Games with Paes. She also has a mixed doubles gold medal at the 2003 Asian Games with Mahesh Bhupathi. While Bopanna does not match up to the impressive tally, he does match up to her commanding style of play.

One of the biggest strengths for the pair will be their chemistry and past experience since not all the mixed doubles pairs in the competitions have a lot of experience of playing together. “It’s been very good. Me and Rohan have known each other for a very long time, we have played a lot together. So we are looking forward to playing together in Olympics,” Sania had earlier said.

Bopanna, on the other hand, will be playing men’s doubles with Paes after his initial demand of playing with Saketh Myneni was refused. While there may or may not be residual friction there, Bopanna is sure to put his best foot forward in mixed doubles.

However, Sania is cautious about predictions. “You try and play every tournament, play every match at merit, give your best and hopefully come back with a medal. If you don’t (win a medal) then you try again. You cannot sit and predict what is going to happen,” she had said, despite her earlier statement about mixed doubles being the best bet. Either way, the expectation from the pair is high and there will be a lot of pressure to perform.

However, come August, all that will matter is how two of India’s premier doubles players will play together against some of the top names in the game, including former number ones Roger Federer-Martina Hingis and possibly Rafael Nadal-Garbine Muguruza. Their combined ranking may ensure they get a relatively smoother draw at Rio and if they can put in a performance worthy of their combined strength, they can be pegged as strong medal contenders.