Her Under-18 career so far has been of the sort that makes you think that Kyra Shroff, all things remaining the same, is going to be the last word in Indian women’s tennis for a generation to come. She’s already famous - she even has an entry of her own in BT Dastur’s Eminent Parsis, 1964-2007 - and she’s just turned 18. “I developed a love for tennis very early, first by watching the game on TV, and then it became the focus of my life once I enrolled in the join the Nike Bhupathi Tennis Village.” She was 10 years old then.

And Kyra, who has pushed through in spite of her juvenile diabetes, has made the years count more than most. “It actually pushed me to work harder,” she says of the condition. “And thanks to tennis, my diabetes is actually under control as it stabilises my insulin levels.” Today, she’s poised to break into the big-time senior circuit: it seems fully likely that India will spend the next decade or so eagerly following Kyra’s progress through the Grand Slam lists. “My dream is to make it to the Top 50 in singles and Top 20 in doubles,” she says. “And, of course, to enjoy the game.” When you’ve dedicated your life to it, you deserve the fun of it, after all. When’s that junior US Open, then?

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