Karman Kaur Thandi, at just 17 years of age, is living up to the promise. India's junior No 1 made the second round of the French Open juniors on Sunday, defeating Romania's Oana Gavrila 6-1, 7-5.
She made the pre-quarterfinals of the junior US Open last year and followed it up with another last-16 showing at the Australian Open juniors this year. Karman is the lone Indian in the junior draw at Roland Garros this year.
She will also pair up with Australia's Jaimee Fourlis in the doubles. Backed by Mahesh Bhupathi through the International Premier Tennis League's (IPTL) fund to support talent, Karman, who took up the sport at the age of eight, worked under Bobby Mahal in US and Canada last year before training for three weeks at the Mourataglou Academy in Nice, France in the run-up to this year's junior French Open.
Patrick Mourataglou, who heads the academy, is world No 1 Serena Williams' coach. Standing 6 feet tall, Karman, who has achieved a career-best ranking of 645 in the women's circuit and 42 in the juniors, picks her forehand, serve and staying positive and aggressive on the court at all times as her biggest strengths.
Aditya Sachdeva, her coach of six years, who has also worked with the likes of Yuki Bhambri, couldn't agree more. "She has every attribute to make it as a big player - a huge serve, big forehand, solid backhand," Aditya told ESPN, "Her movements are getting better as she's growing older. Whenever she's in India she trains with me. She needs to play more matches abroad, gain exposure and become a stronger and better athlete. A top-100 spot shouldn't take too long."
Last year, she won the Future Stars under-16 event organised by the WTA in Singapore and even hit a few balls with former Grand Slam champion Li Na to kick off the year-end championship.