Somdev Devvarman life and biography

Somdev Devvarman is a tennis player from India. His parents are from the small state of Tripura in India.

Born in India, Somdev Devvarman came to the United States in 2005 to play college tennis for the University of Virginia. By the time he graduated in 2008, he had won two NCAA singles titles (Devvarman defeated Georgia’s John Isner in the 2007 final, and repeated the following year) and had his jersey retired by the school. Shortly after turning pro, Devvarman won three consecutive tournaments (two Futures and one Challenger). He reached the Chennai final to open the 2009 season, and posted his best-ever result at a Grand Slam at the 2009 U.S. Open by reaching the second round.

CAREER:

2011:
Somdev started 2011 ranked at 108. He started the season with the Chennai Open, an ATP 250 tournament and lost 6-2, 6-4 to qualifier David Goffin in the first round, who was playing the main draw of an ATP event for the first time.

Somdev got the wild card to the 2011 Australian Open because of his good performance in 2010. Playing this tournament for the first time in his career, he lost to Tommy Robredo in the first round. Somdev got top seed in Singapore challenger tournament where he lost to Andrej Martin of Slovakia by 6-3,6-4 in the quarterfinals.

Somdev has been given a direct entry in the South African Tennis Open 2011, an ATP 250 tournament by the virtue of his good rank in the ATP circuit. He lost to the local boy Kevin Anderson by 6-4, 3-6, 2-6 in the final. After this tournament, Somdev reached his career best ranking of 80 as he claimed 150 ATP points from this tournament.

After South African tennis open, Somdev travels to Dubai where he obtained a wild card for playing the 2011 Dubai Tennis Championships. He faced World no.2 Roger Federer in the first round of the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships, where he lost 6-3, 6-3. Somdev lost 45 ATP points due to first round defeat from this tournament. After this tournament, Somdev moved to 93rd rank on ATP ranking chart.

Then Somdev moves to Serbia for playing first round of Davis cup world group 2011 against Serbia. The other team members of Indian Davis Cup team apart from Somdev Devvarman was Rohan Bopanna, Yuki Bhambri and Karan Rastogi. Somdev plays two single rubbers and one doubles against Serbs. He defeated Janko Tipsarevic in the second rubber.Somdev showed remarkable resilience in rallying from an identical down 1-4 in the first two sets and clinching the third set on a tie-break to overpower World No. 45 Tipsarevic 7-5, 7-5, 7-6(3). After this match India managed to keep the scoreline on 1-1 at the opening day. On 2nd day of tie, Indian duo Somdev and Bopanna faces Nenad Zimonjic and Ilija Bozoljac. The Indians took the first set but then went down 6-4, 3-6, 4-6, 6-7(10) in a three hour,12 minute rubber. Defending champions Serbia got a crucial 2-1 lead in a nerve-wracking doubles encounter on the second day of the Davis Cup World Group after this match. In the fourth rubber of the tie, Somdev faced Victor Troicki and lost to him by 6-4, 6-2, 7-5. Somdev got 50 ATP points from first round of Davis cup 2011 and moves to 84th rank on ATP charts issued by ATP on 7 March 2011.

After playing Davis Cup,Somdev reaches California to play at Indian Wells BNP Paribas open(ATP-1000 Tournament). Somdev reached the 4th round of this tournament. This is his best performance at a ATP Masters 1000 event so far.He even never won a single ATP Masters 1000 match prior to this tournament.He started the tournament from qualification rounds and then in the mains draw, he defeated Adrian Mannarino in first round. Then he created a huge upset by beating world No 22 Marcos Baghdatis in second round by 7-5,6-0.Then he stunned Xavier Malisse(World Rank-52) in third round.He beat Xavier Malisse by 6-1,3-6,7-6. He faced the world no.1 Rafael Nadal in the Pre Quarter-finals and lost match by 5-7, 4-6 after giving a tough fight to Nadal.Somdev got 112 ATP points from this tournament and moves to 73rd rank on ATP charts issued by ATP on 21 March 2011. This was his best ranking till this date.

After his good performance in Indian Wells Masters, Somdev moves to play Sony Ericsson Miami Masters ATP 1000 tournament. He defeated world no. 47 Potito Starace in the first round in straight sets 6-2, 6-4 and then stunned big serving sensation Milos Raonic, ranked no. 34 in the world in a tough straight sets match 7-6(5), 7-5. In the third round he lost to 6th rank Spain's David Ferrer by 6-4, 6-2.

Somdev started his clay season from 2011 U.S. Men's Clay Court Championships (ATP-250 Tournament) at Houston, Texas, USA. He lost to world no 27 Guillermo Garcia-Lopez in the 2nd round.

After taking 3 weeks rest,he reached Belgrade to play Serbia open (ATP-250 Tournament. He defeated Mikhail Kukushkin, ranked no. 65 in first round. Then, he stunned World no. 26 Guillermo Garcia-Lopez in 2nd round. In the quarterfinal, he lost to world no. 36 Janko Tipsarevic by 3-6,6-3,4-6. He moves to his career best ranking of 70 on ATP charts issued by ATP on 2nd May 2011.

PERSONAL:
Full name is Somdev Kishore Devvarman
Grew up near Chennai before attending University of Virginia from 2005-08
Earned a sociology degree in May 2008 and turned pro that summer
Captured NCAA singles title in back-to-back seasons in 2007 (d. Georgia's John Isner) and 2008 (d. Tennessee's J.P. Smith) and All-American honours both times
Enjoys music of Dave Matthews band and plays music himself
Member of India's Davis Cup team and has an 0-3 career singles record (at the start of 2010)
In October 2010, he won the singles gold medal at the Commonwealth Games in Delhi with a 64 62 win over Australian Greg Jones
In November 2010, he became the first player since Japan's Toshiro Sakai to win singles and doubles gold medals at the Asian Games
Beat Denis Istomin 61 62 in singles final and partnered Sanam Singh to the doubles title.

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