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Full steam ahead for 'Indian Express'

The battle lines are drawn, for the year-ending Phoenix ATP World Doubles Championship at Hartford.

And this time round, it is 'Indian Express' -- as tennis afficionadoes know the Mahesh Bhupathi-Leander Paes pairing -- who have the best chance of winning the most prestigious event on the doubles calendar.

If they do, they will finish the year in the number one slot in the world -- for Bhupathi and Paes, both the dream, and the goal they have worked towards, for two years now.

Their performances this year have catapulted them into pole position, to the extent that they are now being viewed, on the circuit, as natural successors to the legendary Woodies, and the Dutch team of Jacco Eltingh and Paul Haarhuis.

The story begins, really, way back in 1996 when the two friends teamed up to play doubles. Success was immediate, and striking -- three Challenger titles (at Aruba, Madras and Ahmedabad) signalled that they had arrived.

But it was in the 1997 season that they really hit the headlines, winning six tournaments including the one in Chennai, and the Mercedes Super 9 event in Montreal. In the process, they jumped into the top ten, and qualified for the Hartford World Doubles Championship, where they reached the final before losing to Rick Leach and Jonathan Stark.

They started the year at Key Biscayne, in the Lipton Championship where they beat Pat Cash/Tebbut in the first round before losing to Black/Connell in the second.

Then came the Chennai title -- and the hottest streak of the year, for this or any pairing. Chennai was the maiden ATP title, which they followed up with the Prague Challenger and Paegas Czech Open to garner three trophies within the month.

In the first week of May, they completed a 15-match win streak taking the Jerusalem Challenger. Their streak ended with a second round loss at the French Open, and another second round loss at Queens/Stella Artois to the Woodies, following which they went under, this time in the first round, at Wimbledon.

From defeat to victory was a mere step away, as the duo took their first Super 9 title at Montreal. In the Du Maurier Championship, the Indians humbled Eagle/Florent, Johnson/Montana, Haas/Robichaud, and Kronemann/ McPherson on their way to the finals, where they beat number three seeds Lareau/OBrien.

Next stop, the Cincinnati Super 9, where they beat Waite/Wibier and Johnson/Montana before losing in the quarterfinals to the then number one ranked Woodies.

Followed the New Haven Pilot Pen Open, which gave them their fourth ATP title of the year. Seeded sixth, they knocked over Djordjevic/Haggard, Meligeni/Pereira, Boteboom/Wibier and second seeds Eltingh/Haarhuis before smashing the Lareau/O'Brien combo yet again in a major final.

This was followed by a semifinal placing at the US Open, the Indians going down to the eventual winners Yevgeny Kafelnikov and Karol Vacek.

Their performance though was good enough to win them their first ever number one seeding, at the Beijing Open -- and they responded with a title win. Another number one ranking at Singapore, for the Open, saw them cruise to their sixth title of the year.

Next came the Stuttgart Super 9. Seeded 5th, they lost to fourth seeds Lareau and O'Brien in the quarters, ending a 9-match streak. At this point, however, they had won 25 matches out of the last 28 played, and were red hot.

Taking that form into the World Doubles Championships, they defied their sixth seeding by storming into the final. In the last four stage, they defeated the higher ranked Lareau/O'Brien combo -- who, with three defeats in four meetings, were rapidly becoming their favourite bunnies. However, the Indian pair, looking rather jaded, lost the final to fourth seeds Rick Leach and Jonathan Stark.

Their stupendous run that year, however, was good enough to take them to the number four slot in world rankings -- a commendable jump for a team that was, at the same time the previous year, poised at number 36.

In individual rankings, both players hit personal highs with Mahesh finishing the year on number 9, while Paes was one rung below at 10 -- compared to 89 and 105, respectively, the year before.

During the year, the two played 63 matches, including the Davis Cup and Asia Cup encounters, and won 52 -- an incredible success rate.

The hardest thing to do is start a fresh season as you have ended the previous one -- but Paes and Bhupathi had no problems, beginning 1998 with a fluent win in the Qatar Mobil Open at Doha.

Next came the Australian Open, where they lost to Jonas Bjorkman/Jacco Eltingh in the semifinal. Back they came, however, with a title win in the Dubai Open, for their second title of the year.

At the Key Biscayne Super 9, they were to reprise their previous year's performance with a second round loss -- but they followed it up quickly with another successful title defence in Chennai.

Next came the Monte Carlo Super 9, where they lost in the semis to the then second ranked (now ranked number one) team of Jacco Eltingh and Paul Haarhuis. However, that defeat was compensated for with a win at the next Super 9 -- the Italian Open, where they downed Wayne Ferreira and Rick Leach in the finals to claim their second Super title.

Seeded third at Roland Garros, the pair went under in the semifinals to eventual titlists Mark Knowles and Daniel Nestor in the semis. This was followed by another semifinal loss at the Stella Artois, Queens, at the hands of Jonas Bjorkman and Patrick Rafter in straight sets.

Wimbledon '98 saw another early exit, when the two friends lost to the J.Gimlestob/B.MacPhie pairing in the second round. Immediately thereafter, they went to the Toronto Super 9 as defending champions, but lost -- again in the semis -- to third seeds Ferreira/Leach.

At New Haven, again, the defending champions crashed to a second round defeat at the hands of W.Arthurs/P.Tramacchi, and then reprised their previous year's US Open showing when they reached the semis before losing to Sandon Stolle and Cyril Suk.

The Shanghai Heineken Open saw them go in, yet again, as defending champions. This time, there were no slip ups -- rather, an upset as they thumped the famed Woodies in the final. The rival pairs clashed immediately thereafter in the final of the Singapore Heineken Open, but this time fortunes were reversed, with the Woodies coming out on top.

Up next was the Stuttgart Super 9, where they improved their previous year's showing but lost the final to the S.Lareau/A.O'Brien pairing. They stormed back to defeat the same pair in the second round of the Paris Indoor Super 9, downed their US Open conquerors S.Stolle/C.Suk in the third round, defeated Richie Reneberg/Jonathan Stark in the semis and then came the finals, where they convincingly defeated top seeds J.Eltingh/P.Haarhuis.

This was their biggest win -- not least because they dumped the world's top ranked pair, but also in the process collected the most number of ATP points, not to mention dollars. The points won also saw them achieve an ambition -- at the end of the previous year they had said they were aiming to overtake the Woodies, and they did it here, displacing the famed Australian combo in both team and individaul rankings.

Now ensconced in the number two slot, they have 400 points more than the Woodies, and are just 188 points behind the top ranked Eltingh-Haarhuis pair. Which means that while they can't be overtaken, they can, with one more lung-busting performance, overtake the Dutch pair to finish the year on number one.

The Paris Indoor Super 9 was their 12th title in 15 finals, including the last World Doubles at Hartford. They are now 20-3 in the last 20 matches, and 49-11 for the year 1998 at a winning rate of 82%.

In the Hartford tournament this year, the Indians are drawn in the "Gold Group" alongside number four seeds Knowles/Nestor, number six Stolle/Suk and number 8 Johnson/Montana.

Top seeds Eltingh/Haarhuis are in the "Green Group" with number three seeds Woodies, No. 5 Ferreira/Leach and No. 7 Delaitre/Santoro.

Within the Gold Group, the Paes-Bhupathi pair have a good head to head, being up 4-2 against their various rivals. However, that kind of record means little in a prestigious tournament of this kind -- on the day, it is what you do out on the court that counts, not your career record.

Interestingly, if you take the Woodies out, Leander/Mahesh are 10-5 against the other 6 teams. Against the Flying Dutchmen, perched on top in world doubles, Leander/Mahesh lead by 3-2 (excluding a Davis Cup loss).

The Indian Express won the first two matchups against the world number one pair --6-4, 7-5 in the 1996 New Haven tournament and 4-6, 6-3, 6-3 in the 1997 New Haven tournament. Then they lost 3-6, 2-6 at Hartford '7 in the final, lost again 6-2, 6-7(5), 7-5 at the Monte Carlo semifinals this year, then won 6-4, 6-2 at the Paris Super-9 final three weeks back.

For the Woodies, it is the Indians who are the main stumbling block -- take them out, and the Aussie pair are 20-13 against the field. In fact, only the top three teams have winning records against the field -- Delaitre/Santoro have a 15-4 record since the US Open, which ATP dubs the hottest streak since the Open, but the Indians have a 15-3 record including a win over Delaitre/Santoro in the semis of the Stuttgart Super-9!

Knowles/Nestor have returned to the form they had before rib injuries to both in mid-97 kept them away for almost a year - following their comeback, they reached the semis of the the French Open (beating Bhupathi/Paes in the last four stage before losing to the Dutchmen, then reached the finals of the US Open before losing to Stolle/Suk).

The Woodies have 51 titles, the Dutchmen have 38 -- which puts them at number three and number 6, respectively, on the all time list in the Open era since 1968. McEnroe/Fleming and Bob Hewitt & Frew McMillan have 57 each to top that list.

Leander/Mahesh need 8 more titles to reach the top-10 with 20 titles.

The Woodies have a tour-high 55 wins this year (55-14) and have been in eight consecutive ATP doubles championships, breaking the record of Fleming-McEnroe (78-84). Sergio Casal and Emilio Sanchez also have had 8 appearances. Nobody however seems capable of beating the McEnroe-Fleming record, which reads 14-0 in seven consecutive years.

This Hartford tournament is being considered the farewell tourney for one of the greatests of all time - Jacco Eltingh, who retires after this. He is going out in style, having won three Grand Slam titles (and missed a chance for the first true doubles Grand Slam since 1951 by Ken McGregor and Frank Sedgman due to the birth of a baby boy a day before the draw at US Open). Eltingh-Haarhuis have a 41-4 match record this year, with 8 titles in 9 finals - their only loss in a final was to 'Indian Express' three weeks back.

Leander/Mahesh are still the youngest team in the field, with a combined age of 49.

At Hartford - each round robin win fetches 90 points (three round robin matches, Wednesday through Friday for each team against the other three in the group) and $195,000 to share.

A semifinal win is worth an extra 180 points and an extra $40,000 to share.

A title is worth 270 points and $70,000.

Leander - Mahesh Team Ranking points - 1998