Anand Moorthy loves tennis, recalls a game with Leander Paes as his best memory

Anand Moorthy, Founder and CEO, Props AMC has been a sports person all his life. He says he prefers playing more than watching sport. He told ET Panache, "While I like all racquets games and play them well, I was Rajasthan state champion in lawn tennis and have been playing the 35+ and 40+ circuits in Mumbai regularly for the last 5 years."

Tennis has been a special game for the real estate boss. "It’s a great combination of anticipation, endurance and planning. The ball speed is always against the body mass and it needs a huge alignment of all your body parts including your heart to support playing good tennis," he explained.

Moorthy if he is lucky plays the game twice a week and it is a great source of relaxation for him. "The tennis ball takes away my mind and body and the racquet becomes the means to tackle it. Having said that, it takes away a lot to play a coordinated sport like lawn tennis. The opponent usually takes real stress," he said.

A member at the MCA-Club, Bandra the Props AMC Founder ends up playing with many clubs like Khar Gymkhana, The Club-Andheri, Practennis-Andheri, among others. "Mumbai has a close-knit circuit of Elite players who play competitive tennis from age 35-50 years every fortnight including rainy days. Very fewer fellows from real estate or tech at my level known to me in tennis. But there are a bunch of bankers, asset managers, entrepreneurs, businessmen who play the sport passionately," he added.

The best memory of the game for Moorthy has been a thrilling opportunity to rally with tennis star Leander Paes. "This is something, I will never forgot, while he was practising for a match in Jaipur. I got a chance to be a ball boy in the Davis Cup match between India – Chile in 1997 for all five matches. Imagine seeing Paes- (Mahesh) Bhupathi (world champions) in action at the closest distance. They qualified in the round of 16 that year," he ended with a huge grin.