Bengaluru: Thirteen-year-old Srishti Kiran is India’s newest tennis prodigy. The Bengaluru teen is the highest ranked player in her age bracket in the world.
She walked onto the ITF J100 finals in Guatemala on Saturday having already beaten the second seed. She went head to head with the top-seeded player at the tournament, 16-year-old Ellery Mendell.
She lost the match, but her ITF Junior Ranking rose—from 461 to 357. A career high for her.
While ITF has no official rankings for players in her age bracket, the number means Kiran is the world’s top tennis player in the Under 13 category.
She’s reached this stage on the back of a dream run—five consecutive ITF junior titles before Guatemala. What’s even more impressive is she got here by only competing in eight ranking events out of a maximum of ten.
She missed two because of financial and logistical constraints.
“I’m really happy to become World No. 1 in my age group. It’s something I wasn’t thinking about at the start of the year, but all the hard work with my coaches, family and support team is paying off,” Kiran told PTI.
Also read: Sorry IPL, football fandom is different altogether. Arsenal’s EPL victory parade is proof
Who is Srishti Kiran?
Kiran’s father, Kiran Gopalrajan was an aspiring cricketer, who had to give up the sport because of his family’s financial constraints. When he began noticing his daughter’s athletic ability, he decided he wouldn’t let the same happen to her.
“Even when Srishti was 3 years old, she was faster and smarter than kids of her age…that’s when I realised Srishti could be nurtured into an athlete,” he told Deccan Herald.
Kiran, now a class 8 student at Baldwin Girls’ High School in Bengaluru, began coaching at age four at the Karnataka State Lawn Tennis Association. She has been training under Dhyan Uthappa at Tennis Advantage Academy for the last four years.
She first made headlines at the age of seven, when she became the youngest player in India to win consecutive All India Tennis Association (AITA) Under-10 Championships.
Her gaze is now on the grass. Subject to gaining a main draw entry, she is expected to compete at a J300 event in the UK—one of the circuit’s more prestigious lead-up events—ahead of the Wimbledon Junior Championships.
“Playing on grass and hopefully competing at Wimbledon Juniors is a dream for every young tennis player. If I get into the J300 event, it will be a great opportunity to learn and test myself against some of the best juniors in the world,” said Kiran.