If there’s one game that offers a linguistically creative person copious opportunities to get wisecracking, it’s tennis. Sample, for instance, the latest quip doing the rounds since this year’s Australian Open drew to a close in Melbourne last week. What’s common to Casanova, the legendary playboy, and current Australian Open mixed doubles champion Mahesh Bhupathi? The answer: when it comes to ‘cou- rting’ women, no one seems to do a better job.

Jokes apart, it doesn’t require a rocket scientist’s reckoning to infer that Bhupathi ? who turned tennis professional when he was all of 21 ? knows how to get along with his women on the tennis court. And if his victory in the Australian Open mixed doubles category on Sunday ? with former World No. 1 Martina Hingis ? is any indication, the Bangalorean has the capability to pull it off virtually with anyone partnering him, as long as the person happens to be a woman.

Figures aptly back up that inference. The win at Melbourne was Bhupathi’s tenth Grand Slam victory, six of which have come with women partners. What’s more interesting is the fact that no woman has ever taken a Grand Slam podium twice with the 31-year-old Indian.

But be it Rika Hiraki, Ai Sugiyama, Elena Likhovtseva, Mary Pierce, Daniela Hantuchova or Hingis, Bhupathi has always taken to the circumstances like a fish to water. “It’s difficult, and needs a lot of adaptation, because every player has her own playing style and I have to adjust my own movements and baseline play accordingly,” he admitted in a telephonic interview with The Telegraph. “But once that is sorted out, things become a lot easier.”

Born on June 7, 1974 in Chennai, Bhupathi spent much of his childhood in Muscat and Dubai, where he was initiated to tennis by his father, Krishna Bhupathi.

“Being his coach in his formative years, I trained him extensively on the hard courts available in the Middle-East, to see that he evolves into a good baseline player,” says Bhupathi senior. “He was always a big hitter, and I wanted to tap that talent of his to make sure that he eventually enjoyed an inbuilt advantage of hard courts, which, as an accomplished doubles player, he enjoys today.”

After completing basic education in West Asia, Bhupathi moved to the United States for advanced studies. And it was during his days at the University of Mississippi ? through 1994-95 ? that his childhood dedication began to pay off. Over the season, Bhupathi not only reaped the prestigious All America singles and doubles titles, but won the National Collegiate Athletic Association doubles title to finish as the No. 1 doubles and No. 3 singles player in the American university circuit.

Professional tennis, by then, was beckoning the man also known for his firm handshake and a sharp sense of humour. Bhupathi soon took the plunge, and the honours began to come almost naturally.

In 1995, Bhupathi won a silver and three gold medals in the SAF Games and earned a place in the Indian Davis Cup squad, where he partnered Leander Paes to take India to the quarter finals of the Elite World Group.

The young guns Rohan Bopanna: This 27-year-old right-handed player reached the men’s doubles final in this year’s edition of the Chennai Open Prakash Amritraj: Son of tennis legend Vijay Amritraj, the 23-year-old partnered Bopanna in his Chennai Open campaign. The duo lost the title to Slovakian Michal Mertinak and Petr Pala of the Czech Republic Harsh Mankad: Son of Indian Test cricketer Ashok Mankad and former national tennis champion Nirupama Vasanth, this 26-year-old lad from Mumbai turned professional in 2002.

Bhupathi then went on to represent India in the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, and in 1997, got his first taste of Grand Slam victory when he teamed up with Hiraki to win the French Open mixed doubles title. In the process, Bhupathi ? now ranked 22 in the ATP world doubles rankings ? also became the first Indian to ever win a Grand Slam title.

History was being made, but Bhupathi ? who has an ear for Bollywood tunes and listens to Anu Malik compositions amid all his jetsetting ? didn’t just stop there. In the coming years, the universally renowned Lee-Hesh duo, comprising Paes and Bhupathi, went for the Slams with vengeance, and conquered Rolland Garros twice ? in 1999 and 2001 ? apart from being crowned men’s doubles champions at Wimbledon in 2000.

The women, meanwhile, came and went. And if Bhupathi ? along with Paes ? was basking in the glory of being the world’s top men’s doubles duo on the one hand, he was also picking up mixed doubles titles on the other, and at a steady pace too.

“He began with the lesser-known players, but once he had made a name for himself in the mixed doubles circuit, the Pierces and Hantuchovas began to take interest,” says his Bangalore-based father.

By 2002, Bhupathi had in his kitty an enviable seven Grand Slam doubles titles, not to mention a clutch of sundry ATP tour victories. An Arjuna award winner in 1996, Bhupathi won the Padma Shri along with Paes in 2001.

Much water, of course, has flowed under the bridge since then. The Lee-Hesh partnership, following mutual differences between Bhupathi and Paes, was soon sentenced to near oblivion. Globosport ? a sports management firm with clients as big as Sania Mirza, with Bhupathi as president ? was born, and Bhupathi also tied the knot with Chennai model Shweta Jaishankar.

But despite the tidings, tennis has never taken a backseat for the baseline ace. “The Davis Cup begins next week, and that’s all that is on my mind now,” says Bhupathi when asked how he wants to cool off after a hard-earned Australian Open title.

What’s perhaps not on his mind, however, is whether Hingis would be beside him the next time he walks up to a mixed doubles trophy. For women may come and women may go, but Hesh seemingly goes on for ever.