My love affair with sports began when I was but a child. My father, sisters and cousins used to watch Cricket, Tennis, Football and sometimes even Basketball. But I remember it was my love for tennis that overshadowed every other infatuation. As Andre Agassi wrote in his autobiography, tennis is a lonely sport… one man fighting against his opponent, himself and his demons… a lonely battle that stretches to two, three sometimes four or five agonizing hours.
Years ago, I remember sitting in my nanaji’s house one hot day and as was the rule, watching a tennis match with the television on mute (he was a disciplinarian and watching television in the morning, afternoon and night was against his house law)… But, I was incorrigible…
An almost gaunt-looking young lad caught my eye… I don’t remember his opponent, but it was perhaps one of the clay matches they were playing… The name of the boy my eyes were fixed on was Novak Djokovic and the first thing that came to my mind was how, if he ever became a champion, people could call him Super Nova… one of the only scientific names I remembered and loved.
Novak Djokovic, Nole, as he is lovingly called, and (D)joker that his opponents would often term him whenever he would fail to complete matches and be found limping on the court, struggling to play a four or five-setter, literally grew up with me… we are age-mates, you see…
People all around me were so much in love with Rafa and Roger that even admitting the admiration I had for Novak required a different kind of confidence and guts. And I had that in plenty. Novak could easily have gone the Marat Safin way. But, he chose to pen it differently.
The story of my life ran parallel to his. We – Novak and I – were the same age when we left our comfort zones to conquer the gauntlets that the game of life threw at us… Whenever I read in the papers that Novak had reached the quarters of a big tournament, I would say a little prayer for him and, at the same time, prepare myself that I should not be disheartened if I open the papers the next day only to find that he’s gone. But the alphabets started coming together to tell a different story.
He wasn’t giving up… He was no longer huffing and puffing during the matches and was a changed man, both mentally and physically… big matches did not scare him… long hours on court could not tire him… stories of his physical transformation started doing the rounds… Novak was silencing his critics in the best way possible… he was winning matches… crucial matches… which I believe is not possible without a change of lifestyle. A complete overhauling is what he was undergoing. The limitations in his mind were no competition for his imagination… he imagined that he could be in the same league as his two awesomely talented and diligent contemporaries and he ended up being there… right Up There.
Over the years, he has won almost every title and tournament that he has participated in, not one but many number of times (except the French – a trophy he just recently, for the very first time, earned)… but he is the same man… he loves to play around (pun intended), make people laugh, work constantly to become a champion but not a machine, to remain grounded and real. Of course, not everyone loves him, but that won’t change him… Novak is on his way to become Super Nova… his goodness, graciousness and greatness is for everyone to emulate and see.
I was trying to identify you with super nova and believe me idid