Sriram Balaji (born 18 March 1990) is an Indian professional tennis player. Balaji has a career high ATP singles ranking of world No. 287, achieved on 19 June 2017 and a doubles ranking of world No. 96 achieved on 23 July 2018. Balaji has won a total of 9 ITF singles titles on the futures circuit as well as 43 doubles ITF Futures and 6 Challenger doubles titles on the circuit. He is currently a member of the Indian Davis Cup team. He played his debut Davis cup partnering

Rohan Bopanna Rohan Bopanna ( ; born 4 March 1980) is an Indian professional tennis player. His singles career-high ranking was world No. 213 in 2007 and his career-high ranking in doubles was world No. 3 on 22 July 2013. He has been a member of the Indian ...

in March 2017 making India win 3–0 and enter into Davis Cup World Play off.

Personal life

Sriram was born to Narayanaswamy and Jayanthi Narayanaswamy in

Coimbatore Coimbatore, also spelt as Koyamputhur (), sometimes shortened as Kovai (), is one of the major metropolitan cities in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It is located on the banks of the Noyyal River and surrounded by the Western Ghats. Coimbato ...

. He started playing tennis at the age of nine. He succeeded his schooling from Kendriya Vidyalaya and PERKS Matriculation Higher Secondary School in Coimbatore. He started his tennis career at PERKS Tennis Academy, Coimbatore. He is currently getting trained at Schüttler-Waske Tennis University in Germany. His hobbies are swimming and reading books. His favorite tennis player is Roger Federer. Balaji is presently a Junior Officer in the

Indian Army The Indian Army is the land-based branch and the largest component of the Indian Armed Forces. The President of India is the Supreme Commander of the Indian Army, and its professional head is the Chief of Army Staff (COAS), who is a four- ...

. The Army has supported his sports endeavours.

Junior career

* Represented India for the Nike International Masters Tennis Tournament held at Sun City, South Africa during November 2002 and Won Three Countries and obtained ninth position in the Team event. * Ranked No.1 in National Level Competition Under 14 age Category during April – September 2004. * Represented India for the Asia/Oceania Qualifying, World Junior Tennis Competition held at Melbourne, Australia during MAY 10 – 15, 2004. 16 Countries participated and obtained 11th Position in Team event. * Represented India for Junior Davis Cup Tournament held at Kuching, Malaysia during April 2006. * Participated in 15th Asian Games, Youth Camp during 28 November to 9 December 2006 held at Doha, Qatar.

Career

Balaji made his ATP main draw debut at the

2012 Aircel Chennai Open The 2012 Aircel Chennai Open was a 2012 ATP World Tour tennis tournament, played on outdoor hard courts. It was the 17th edition of the only ATP tournament taking place in India and took place at the SDAT Tennis Stadium in Chennai, India. It was ...

in the doubles event, partnering

Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan (born 20 October 1988) is an Indian professional tennis player. He has a career-high ranking of No. 64 achieved on 18 March 2019. He won the doubles title with Rohan Bopanna at the 2017 Chennai Open, in a historic final ...

. The wildcard pairing put up a good fight, but lost to the second seeds

Scott Lipsky Scott Lipsky (born August 14, 1981 in Merrick, New York) is an American former professional tennis player and coach. As a player, Lipsky was primarily a doubles specialist. As a junior, Lipsky was ranked No. 1 in the U.S. in singles in 1995, a ...

and Rajeev Ram 5–7, 4–6. At the

2014 Aircel Chennai Open The 2014 Aircel Chennai Open was a 2014 ATP World Tour tennis tournament, played on outdoor hard courts. It was the 19th edition of the only ATP tournament taking place in India and took place at the SDAT Tennis Stadium in Chennai, India, from 3 ...

, Balaji was given a wildcard into the doubles event with

Ramkumar Ramanathan Ramanathan Ramkumar (born 8 November 1994) is an Indian professional tennis player. He has been ranked as high as No. 111 in singles by the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP), which he achieved in July 2018, and in doubles at No. 58 ach ...

. The Indian pair defeated Lipsky and Ram, who Balaji had lost to in 2012, 7–5, 6–3. In the quarterfinals the pair lost to Croatian-duo

Marin Draganja Marin Draganja (; born 13 May 1991) is a Croatian professional tennis player and competes mainly on the ATP World Tour in doubles. Draganja reached his highest ATP singles ranking, No. 550 on 29 April 2013, and his highest ATP doubles ranking, ...

and

Mate Pavić Mate Pavić (; born 4 July 1993) is a Croatian professional tennis player who is a former world No. 1 in doubles. He is a five-time Grand Slam champion, having won three titles in men's doubles: the 2018 Australian Open with Oliver Marach, th ...

, 3–6, 3–6. Balaji joined the Mumbai Tennis Masters team for

Champions Tennis League India The Champions Tennis League (CTL) was a team tennis tournament in India held two times only in November 2014 and in late 2015, across six Indian cities. The first edition of Champions Tennis League was held from 17 to 26 November 2014, across M ...

. He reached his first ATP final at the 2023 Tata Open Maharashtra with compatriot

as an alternate pair.https://www.atptour.com/en/news/gille-vliegen-pune-2023-double-final

ATP career finals

Doubles: 1 (1 runner-up)

Challenger and Futures finals

Singles: 23 (9–14)

Doubles: 84 (52–32)

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Balaji, Sriram 1990 births Living people Tamil sportspeople Indian male tennis players People from Coimbatore Racket sportspeople from Tamil Nadu Kendriya Vidyalaya alumni South Asian Games gold medalists for India South Asian Games silver medalists for India South Asian Games medalists in tennis