Davis Cup: Mukund Sasikumar denies AITA ban, calls it ‘false information’

On late Friday night, Indian tennis player Mukund Sasikumar took to his Instagram profile to rubbish media claims of a reported two-tie ban imposed on him by the All India Tennis Association (AITA). This reaction came after the Davis Cup squad was announced ahead of the World Group I tie against Sweden.

The team that’s set to face its Scandinavian counterparts in the September matches included current WR 74 Sumit Nagal, Ramkumar Ramanathan, N Sriram Balaji, Niki Poonacha, and Siddharth Vishwakarma.

“Mukund was handed a two-tie suspension by the Executive Committee for his consistent refusal to play for the national team. He did it three times in a row, so he was not to be considered for two ties. This is the first tie and he will not be considered in the next one too,” an AITA source told PTI.

In retort, Sasikumar lambasted this information about the ban and called it “completely false”. “I was asked to play by captain and coach, and I chose not to play because one, I don’t have a visa and two, I just didn’t want to be there due to bad management,” his social media post read.

When the Indian team was announced ahead of the February Davis Cup tie against Pakistan, which Indian won 4-0, Nagal and Sasikumar, had expressed their reluctance to make the Davis Cup team owing to their professional commitments.

The Chennai lad also said how he was oblivious about any ban being imposed on him. “They came up with a ban which nobody knew about, including me. If I had a ban, why was I asked?”

A look at AITA’s official website reveals no announcement about a ban on Sasikumar.

“Bad treatment is the biggest reason why an athlete loses interest for national duty despite that being the biggest honour,” his post further read.