Sania to lead India's Asiad campaign

Leander Paes and Sania Mirza will lead India's campaign in both the individual and team tennis events at the Asian Games, in Doha in December.

Paes, who last played a singles match as Davis Cup captain against Pakistan in Mumbai in April, will be joined by Mahesh Bhupathi, Rohan Bopanna, Harsh Mankad, Karan Rastogi and Prakash Amritraj in the individual men's event.

Mankad, who was not available for Davis Cup duties this year, has been chosen ahead of Amritraj by virtue of his better ATP Tour ranking in the team event alongside Paes, Bhupathi and Bopanna.

Amritraj and Rastogi are in the reserves.

In doubles, Paes will pair with former Grand Slam partner Bhupathi while Amritraj will take the court alongside Bopanna, according to the team announced by All India Tennis Association on Tuesday.

The women's team comprises Sania, Shikha Uberoi, Ankita Bhambri, Isha Lakhani, Rushmi Chakravarthy and Sandya Nagraj in the individual competition.

The first four of them will play the team event while Rushmi and Sandhya are the reserves.

The doubles teams comprise the pairings of Sania and Shikha and Ankita with Isha.

Paes and Sania form the star mixed doubles combine while Bhupathi and Shikha constitute the second team.

The singles nominations will be announced later.

The AITA also confirmed Paes and Sania representing India in the Asian Hopman Cup, to be played in Hyderabad in November.

It also announced the appointment of Akhtar Ali as the non-playing captain for the Indo-Pak Series, which will feature four one-day ties on November 6th, 8th, 10th and 12th.

Bopanna, Rastogi, Divij Sharan and Vivek Shokeen form the Indian team for the matches that will be held at Islamabad, Lahore, Chandigarh and Gurgaon respectively.