The All India Tennis Association (AITA) on Monday replaced the country’s No.1 tennis player Sumit Nagal with the 16-year-old Manas Dhamne for the Davis Cup World Group tie against Sweden.
The 27-year-old Sumit, who played all four Grand Slams this year, and reached a career-best rank of 73, announced that he was compelled to withdraw from the tie owing to a back strain. The injury had also forced Sumit to pull out of the doubles event in the ongoing US Open in New York.
“The decision to replace Sumit Nagal with the tennis sensation Manas Dhamne, was taken after a thorough assessment of performances by the chairman of selection committee, Nandan Bal, along with captain Rohit Rajpal and coach Ashutosh Singh,” stated Anil Dhupar, the secretary general of AITA.
Manas, who trains at the Piatti Centre in Italy, had reached a career-best junior rank of 43 last year. He has been competing in the men’s circuit regularly for the past many months.
Ramkumar Ramanathan, Niki Poonacha, Sidharth Vishwakarma and Sriram Balaji are the other members of the Indian team. The young Aryan Shah had been announced as a reserve.
The tie will be played in an indoor hardcourt in Stockholm, Sweden, on September 14 and 15.
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