Sania Mirza admitted she considered quitting after becoming engulfed in another controversy back home this month but played on due to her love of her country and the game.
MELBOURNE: Tired of being dragged into various off-court controversies time and again, Sania Mirza on Tuesday disclosed that she considered quitting tennis last week.
The world number 31 from India, often in the eye of storm, said she found it tough to deal with question marks on her loyalty towards the country after being photographed at the Hopman Cup in Perth with her bare feet positioned near Indian national flag and was charged for 'disrespecting' the tricolour.
"It's not easy to deal with things like that off the court. I am not a superhuman so it does affect me."
"As much as I try to block it out, it's still in the back of your mind. A lot of thoughts went through my head in the past couple of weeks, and one of the thoughts was quitting," said the player who was also criticised by the orthodox Muslim clergy for her short skirts and T-shirts.
"But I wouldn't say that they were serious enough that I would quit right now. But it was very tricky to play again, I wasn't sure if I was going to be able to blank out everything and play a tennis match," she said after defeating Uzbekistan's Iroda Tulyaganova 6-4 6-2 in the first round of the season's first Grand Slam.
Sania defended herself by saying, "I wouldn't do anything to disrespect my country, I love my country. I wouldn't be playing Hopman Cup otherwise. But other than that, I am not allowed to comment because it is before the courts."
"It does play on your mind, you do start to think that at the end of the day, I am not a politician to outsmart people."
"That's not what I am trying to do, which is to play tennis. I'm 21 and trying to be the best I can be," Sania said.
On Indian cricketers threatening to quit their tour Down Under over the suspension of Harbhajan Singh for allegedly racially abusing Andrew Symonds and a series of poor umpiring decisions, Sania said, "At the end of the day, it is a sport, and we deal with bad line calls on a daily basis," but added 'I have my own set of controversies to deal with.'
Sania also rubbished the claims of corruption in women's tennis. "I've never been approached and I don't personally know anyone who has."
"As far as we know women's tennis is clean, a lot has happened of course in the men's, there's a lot of talk, but on the whole women's tennis is clean and we're going to do our best to keep it that way."
The 21-year-old described her passion for the game as so strong that she could not imagine throwing a match, saying it would be like 'selling my soul'.
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