Omar Behroozian remains committed to playing Davis Cup for the UAE next year but admits the younger players need to step up to help bolster the team.
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The veteran tennis player, now 33 years old, made his Davis Cup debut for the UAE back in 1996 and is approaching two decades of service for his country’s national team.
He won all his singles matches in the five ties he played in Group IV action in Bahrain last week but it wasn’t enough to secure promotion to Group III for the UAE, who lost their playoff to Pacific Oceania 2-1 and will stay in the Davis Cup’s lowest tier of competition next year.
In Bahrain, Behroozian led the team alongside Mahmoud Nader Al Balooshi with two juniors – Abdulla Ahli and Fares Janahi – completing the squad.
Davis Cup regular Hamad Janahi was unavailable for selection, nor was his cousin Abdulrahman Janahi.
Al Balooshi turns 35 next June and no longer plays full time tennis, while the two juniors were making their Davis Cup debut and aren’t ready to make a real impact on the team as yet.
They made a somewhat positive start to their Davis Cup career however, winning the doubles matches they took part in, none of which were deciders though.
.@OBehroozian guides #UAE to victory over Bangladesh in #DavisCup Group IV http://t.co/P4nAzhPJA4 @ReemAbulleil pic.twitter.com/PrzctvfeGA
— Sport360° (@Sport360) April 29, 2015
Behroozian has long called for the development of young Emirati talent and he’s feeling cautiously optimistic regarding the juniors who helped out last week.
“I think the three young players Abdulla, Fares and Fahad (Janahi), they are competitive,” said Behroozian.
“They’ve been exposed to a lot of competitive tennis, whether it being in ITF tournaments, Junior Davis Cup, West Asia competition.
“I think for them, this Davis Cup week was a bit of a wakeup call.
We aren’t very far (from having a complete team with strong young players), but we’re not there yet.
“Mahmoud had a two and a half hour singles match (against Pacific), I had to play singles with my injury, and then we had to play doubles to save the tie.
“Pacific used all their four players. At the moment, we can’t depend on the younger guys in a situation like this.
“The junior players, the next step for them is to make the coaches feel they’re ready to play – not just be part of the team.
“The positive thing is that now they have no excuse anymore. They saw the level, they saw how hard we worked.
“So they can go back to Dubai and think ‘next year we’re going to be ready’.”
As far as his own commitment to the team, Behroozian added: “I don’t think I’m going anywhere anytime soon. I think I’m still pretty competitive.
“Even though there was a bit of doubt with my injury (torn oblique muscle) leading up to Davis Cup, I always try my best, win or lose, qualified or not.
“I always make myself available for the UAE. I’m going to be there a few more years I believe.”
