Former Doubles Wimbledon Champion Sania Mirza talks about her new chapter in her life and how she plans to remove the elite tag from tennis
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00:00Everything that I've been able to accomplish from a young little girl from Hyderabad playing on courts made out of cow dung
00:07where the first day we went, the coach didn't want to even enroll us and said I was too small.
00:12From there to playing and winning Wimbledon, it's been a journey that I can only and only, you know, feel very grateful for.
00:19The dream of having and bringing tennis to the homes of everyday people, I think that is really what we are trying to do.
00:31I think tennis is taken to me to be too much of an elite sport. People think tennis and golf and these are like really, but it's not.
00:38I mean, if to play a sport like tennis, you don't need to be from an elite background.
00:42You need to be normal like playing any other sport, especially in a place like Dubai, you know.
00:47A lot of people that a lot of kids go to a lot of classes and tennis can be one of them.
00:52You don't need to be from the elite elite to play tennis. That's the first thing.
00:55The second thing is that we have been running a very successful tennis academy back home, which is our flagship.
01:00It's, you know, it's a huge academy made on four acres and you know, obviously.
01:04So over here, we're just trying to bring tennis to the homes of especially our communities, the subcontinent communities.
01:11I think it's very, very important for me personally, because I feel that I do have that reach, first of all.
01:20And I feel that I should give back also over here because this is my second home and Dubai has been for a very long time.
01:26And yeah, that's really the concept behind it, you know, just to bring sport and tennis to the everyday life of everybody, of course,
01:34but especially to our communities, because I feel like we are we still kind of push us kids more towards cricket,
01:41especially if they are boys and that's a more automatic choice to make.
01:46And it would be great if that changes a little bit. I mean, if you can send them like we have a couple of kids here who go two days for cricket and one day for tennis now.
01:53So, I mean, that's a good combination education that sport gives you.
01:57And I can't say this enough and I can't stress on this enough because the fact is that sport teaches you how to be resilient.
02:04It teaches you how to fight against the odds. It teaches you how to be humble in victory.
02:10It teaches you how to be, you know, resilient in defeat.
02:13It teaches you to understand that as long as you keep fighting, there can be another day.
02:18And these are life lessons that no education can give you.
02:21There is no one textbook that will teach you this. I promise you.
02:25I know this because I have done my 12th and I went to college for a year and a half and I had to choose between Wimbledon and college and I chose Wimbledon.
02:34And look how that turned out for me. So, I mean, you know, I'm just saying that by God's grace, you know, I was able to make that decision and it was the right decision.
02:43But I'm not saying you should play sport to become professional only. That's not the goal.
02:47The goal to play tennis or to play sport is to have that sporting mentality, to have that fighting spirit, to have that never say die attitude.
02:57I think that's the life lesson that, you know, kids get when they play sport.
03:02I'm not saying that you should not go to school. Education is very important, which is why I did my basic education.
03:07And then when I wanted to become professional, but everybody doesn't become professional.
03:11So I'm saying play a sport to learn the life lessons that sport gives you.
03:15And then you can go to college and you can, you know, you can do whatever you want after.
03:19But I mean, anyway, let's be honest, playing once a week, you're not going to become professional.
03:23I was playing six days a week when I was eight years old, you know, so I'm saying, but there you have to start.
03:28Because sport gives you that commitment, it gives you that discipline as well, right?
03:32There's no other job in the world that you can do as a 10 year old and that can give you discipline.
03:36What can give you that kind of discipline?
03:38And I promise you, in sport, you lose more than you win, most of the time.
03:42So it is very important to know how to lose.
03:45It is very important to know how to deal with the fact of how you're going to react to that loss.
03:51And that's what really defines you as a person.
03:53And that's what builds character.
03:56You know, and I mean, we might think, yeah, four is too young for that or eight is too young for that.
04:00But it's not. That's when their real characters are built.
04:02That's when their real commitment levels are formed, right?
04:06Whether you come on time, whether you wake up on time, you know, you have to go on Tuesday and Thursday.
04:11You got to be there, no matter how hot it is, no matter what the weather is like.
04:15So that's what sport really gives you.
04:17It was my goal, but I wanted to settle down more in terms of like not travel so much like a crazy person like I was, you know,
04:23like a 25-30 week, I was traveling nonstop.
04:26So most definitely it was something that I always did think that I wanted to do.
04:30But at what scale, I wasn't sure.
04:34So we were very lucky that we got two really good centers straight away as soon as we thought,
04:38okay, because now I've decided that I'm going to retire.
04:41It's going to be my last year, last few months.
04:43So I'm like, you know what, I got to, I'm only 35.
04:46I have to keep moving on in life, right?
04:48There is no, I might retire from one profession, but I'm still young enough to build another.
04:51And I feel that we've had so much experience as a family,
04:54and we've had so much experience doing everything that we have done and achieved.
04:59It is time to pass it on too.
05:01And why not, you know, it is time to give back as well.
05:04So the goal is to try and have tennis centers all over the, all over Dubai for sure,
05:10but also all over UAE if we're able to do it.
05:13Thing is that, you know, even the academy back home in Hyderabad, even the academy here in this home,
05:18the whole idea is to start academies where I live so that I can have a personal touch to them.
05:23That is honestly the truth.
05:24I have gotten obviously, you can imagine how many times we've been offered academies to start in,
05:29you know, different countries and different states.
05:31I have not even started a Sanyamwada Tennis Academy outside of Hyderabad.
05:35It's only in Hyderabad.
05:36And that's for a very specific reason.
05:38Because I feel that once you're just like kind of franchising out your name,
05:43then it kind of loses what you're trying to achieve, you know.
05:46So it's not just about a business or it's not just about, oh, okay, this is what I want to do.
05:50I just want my name to be in 50 different places.
05:52It's not about that.
05:53It's about trying to, if I can have five centers all over Dubai,
05:57including like an Abu Dhabi or, you know, somewhere like that,
06:01which is in transportable distance for me,
06:04I can personally be there on a lot of occasions.
06:08And I can have that personal touch.
06:09And that's really what it's really about, you know.
06:12Because only I have that experience to give or what I can say.
06:16And obviously, these coaches are people who have been trained under me.
06:20They've been, as you can see, I came and I spoke to them.
06:22So we all have a, you know, camaraderie.
06:24And as a team, we are working together.
06:26And some goals are still there.
06:28No matter who it is, they will always tell you,
06:31there will be no athlete in the world will tell you,
06:33I've achieved every goal I have had.
06:35If you win 10 grand, you want to win 11.
06:37If you win 11, that's the reason you keep going.
06:40If that goal isn't there, why will you play anymore, right?
06:42But that hunger needs to be there.
06:44And that hunger, which is but natural,
06:46I've been playing tennis since I was six years old.
06:48I'm 36 in the next two months, you know,
06:50it's been a long, long time.
06:52I literally don't know anything else besides playing tennis.
06:56And that's why this, you know,
06:58that's why these centers,
07:00because that's literally what I feel,
07:02that that's all I know.
07:03And that's all I want to impart and I want to give back.
07:06And yeah, like you said,
07:09I think that for me,
07:10if I look back at my journey,
07:12I can only be grateful
07:14for everything that I've been able to achieve.
07:16I can only be grateful for
07:18everything that I've been able to accomplish
07:21from a young little girl from Hyderabad
07:23playing on courts made out of cow dung
07:25where the first day we went,
07:27the coach didn't want to even enroll us
07:29and said I was too small.
07:31From there to playing and winning Wimbledon,
07:33it's been a journey that I can only
07:35and only, you know, feel very grateful for.