Currently, five coaches, including Chief Coach Vinod Seth, are engaged in Kalinga Stadium and coaching more than one hundred young players. The new office of the OTA was also inaugurated by the Minister on this occasion. Other four coaches are: Sibasankar Parida, Sunil Palai, Santosh Kumar Mallik and Uttam Kumar Swain.

The players felicitated by Sports Minister were: Debasis Sahoo and Sohini Sanjay Mohanty. Debasis, currently ranked No 1 in Odisha (U-16 & U-18 age group) is said to have shown huge promise as a budding talent at the national level.

He is the first player from Odisha to play the prestigious junior event of Road to Wimbledon Master Qualifying Tournament in the U-14 boys category in 2019. He is currently preparing for Junior Davis Cup and will make the state proud if he does so in 2022.

Sohini, currently ranked No 1 in U-14 girls category in the state and seventh in India, has started making her journey into big leagues like ITF. She has not only earned numerous laurels but has the distinction of being the youngest player from Odisha to have won more than sixty titles. She finished third representing India in the U-11 Ten-Pro 2019 at Rafal Nadal Academy, Spain.

The OTA office, which was functioning earlier functioning at the official residence of its secretary, will now be located at Kalinga Stadium. The new office has rooms for its president, secretary and administration.

Besides the Sports Minister, who was the chief guest of the function, other dignitaries present were State Sports & Youth Services Secretary R Vineel Krishna, OTA President Asit Tripathy, Secretary Satyajit Mohanty and Joint-Secretary Sanjeeb Panda.

OTA President expressed hope that the academy will produce players of national and international fame. OTA Secretary spelt out the future plan of the academy in promoting tennis in the State and thanked the Sports Department of Government of Odisha for the support in running the academy.
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TOP: A view of the mobile application of Odisha Tennis Academy, which was launched for players in Kalinga Stadium, Bhubaneswar on 5th January 2022.
RIGHT: A view of the new office of Odisha Tennis Association, located in Kalinga Stadium, Bhubaneswar.