HYDERABAD: Allipuram Venkateshwar Reddy, chairman Sports Authority of Telangana State (SATS) on Sunday met the Tokyo-bound Indian women’s doubles duo Sania Mirza and her partner Ankita Raina at the Sania Mirza Tennis Academy at Moinabad here and wished them good luck ahead of the Olympic Games.
It will be the fourth consecutive Olympics for the former World No.1 doubles player Sania Mirza. SATS chief expressed the hope that Sania and her partner Ankita will return with a medal from the Games. He also conveyed the greetings of the chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao and sports minister V Srinivas Goud to the duo.
The 34-year-old Sania had qualified for the Tokyo Games on the basis of her injury-protected ranking of No. 9 while the 28-year-old Ankita is currently ranked 183 in singles and 95 in doubles.
Sania had earlier taken part in three Olympic Games - 2008 Beijing, 2012 London and 2016 Rio Games with three different partners including Sunitha Rao, Rushmi Chakravarthi and Prarthana Thombare respectively.
Sania came close to clinching a medal at the 2026 Rio Games as she and her mixed doubles partner Rohan Bopanna had lost their bronze medal play-off match to Czech Republic duo of Lucie Hradecka and Radek Stepanek 6-1, 7-5 after losing their semifinal match to Venus Williams and Rajeev Ram of the United States earlier.
