Master Sheikh Abdullah is the latest youth sensation on the tennis circuit. Yes, this player ranked number one in Andhra Pradesh, and number five in India, in the Under-16 boys category, is already making waves. Says the 15-year-old pro teen who represented India at the recent International Tennis Federation (ITF) tournament in Indonesia, “I have three ITF tournaments lined up in India (Guwahati, Delhi and Mumbai). The schedule is tight and I am concentrating on the game.”
Someone who began playing tennis at the age of seven and turned professional in six years, Abdullah has clinched 15 talent series, 12 championship series, 8 super series and 4 nationals from the 40-plus tournaments he has played so far!
Coming from a family of sportspersons: his father Sheikh Mehboob was a wrestler, eldest brother Ilyas is a renowned boxer and his two other siblings represent Andhra Pradesh in tennis in the Under-10 and Under-12 boys categories, respectively. Not surprisingly Abdullah was “introduced to tennis very early. As a kid I used to accompany my brother Zubair for practice,” he recalls. Abdullah, whose first choice, oddly enough, was gymnastics changed to tennis because as he says the game “completely fascinated me. Boris Becker and Pete Sampras were my Gods!”
But the going wasn’t as dreamlike as he had hoped. There were challenges that came his way, the foremost being finance. His family runs two-wheeler and second-hand bike shops for a living. The shop once used to run well, but now times are a little hard. His mother worked earlier, but is now a homemaker after both her kidneys failed and dialysis began. Besides which there is the competitive study scene at school, particularly at the +2 level, which Abdullah has now reached. None of these, however, came in the way of Abdullah’s love for the game. “Playing tennis does not disturb my studies or fun time. Life has just become a bit busy but that’s about it,” says the kid, whose daily routine includes tennis practice, fitness training and gymming. “When you are on an international court, you need to focus and make the nation proud. That’s why my full concentration is only on playing good tennis. If there is some time at hand, I play football with friends,” he adds.
But isn’t the envy factor high among his friends? Abdullah is proud to say no in reply to this question. With his friends there is no room for envy. As for future plans — he wants to play for the Indian team in the Olympics and become the first Indian to be a singles Grand Slam champion. And as far the finances are concerned, he is happy to have a sponsor in AppLabs, a software testing and quality management company.
So will it be game, set and match in the end? Abdullah is pretty confident that it will!