Mahesh Bhupathi and Leander Paes are back in the news for a recet war of words between the two. Bhupathi, who is the non-playing captain, for India at the Davis Cup, sais that he had no "personal agenda" in keeping Paes out of the Indian team. He also went on to mention that his former partner's decision to leave the city (Bangalore) in the middle of a tie was the final nail in the coffin.
However, both of them have been vocal about the recent spat on social media. The argument went ugly when Paes was informed that he and Rohan Bopana were not in the Indian squad which was decided by Bhupathi.
Following the delvelopment, Paes, who has 18 Grand Slam titles to his names, accused Bhupathi for being ‘biased.’ Addressing the media, Paes said, “The criterion was supposed to be form, which obviously doesn't seem to be the case. It seems to fluctuate a lot. At one time, it is based on rankings and other times it's based on likes and personal preferences. Sometimes it's not on personal preferences, it is based on who plays deuce court and who plays on ad court. And now it is based on form. On form, you guys know better who has played better,”
However, things did not end here. Paes went on to share his thoughts on Facebook.
Reacting to Paes' statement on social media, Bhupathi also decided to make it public. The 42-year-old former Tennis player wrote an emotional post on his Facebook page.
“Through the twenty years of my career, I always believed facts will always surface and unless I was pushed into a deep hole I never responded or felt the need to because regardless of what was said the media would play is up as a personal feud. Let me the first to say, there was never a personal Feud, when I came on the Davis cup scene in 1994 I was a Leander fan and was excited to see him play Wayne Ferreira who was 10 in the world....
He demolished Ferreira in straight sets. I become more than a fan, besides the tennis, he had the outlandish charm with the tennis hierarchy and media. However things changed quickly, when both our captain sir Jaideep Mukerjea and coach Enrico Piperno were strong armed out of the team end of 1999 because he had heard a rumour of them being upset he didn't come for the tie against Italy but was fully fit to play chennai open the following week, that should have been the first red flag.
He had his own definition or lack of for the word "Respect" and it quickly become apparent there was only one train on the tracks, either you get on or stay home, I could probably write a book on all the instances over the years but I am trying to keep this short.
I always try and treat people how I like to be treated and that's the basic way you treat colleagues. If I were to forget for five minutes, all the times he took his spot on the team for granted and showed up late for Davis cup or the Olympics, or not comply with team requests on uniform or outfit, or blatantly tell the captain or management that things have to fall in place the way he needs them to, his leaving Bangalore on Saturday in the middle of our tie was the final nail in the coffin.
I enforced a gag order on the team so there would be none (drama), but he didn't adhere to that either. I have been given the full support now of the federation, and the selection committee so now there is a New Train on the tracks, it's to get India back to the World group, it's full of energy, youth, positivity, hard work, and dreams..Those who don't like it should stay out of the way because we don't plan to stop till we get there!!!”