I’d heard of the growing prowess of this one talent from Hyderabad, spoken to her briefly on the phone when the occasion required it, but when I’d first met Saina Nehwal, then 18 years-and-one-day-old, I had to ask her how the birthday celebrations went before the standard questions followed.

Saina, then cooling off with stretches after a second round win at an event in New Delhi’s Siri Fort complex, shrugged and said she did nothing. Nothing, really? “Nothing. No cake, nothing,” she said very matter-of-factly, and left me feeling younger of the two. But the fact is that the first thing that strikes you about the current world No. 2 badminton player is her total dedication to her sport, her coach and her vision.

One had quizzed Pullela Gopichand, former All England Open champion Saina’s coach, about the seriousness with which the Indian starlet conducts her business. His response then was, “She may not be the most talented, but she makes up for everything with her hard work.” By then, Saina was already World No.6, and the stickler for perfection had won her maiden Indonesian Open title. It’s taken her over two years to reach within touching distance of the top spot. And it’s credible that she wants it to happen the most befitting way — by beating all the opponents, mostly the fiercely competitive and ruthlessly agile Chinese and Chinese-origins, or when she is the world champion.

Back then, another similar sounding Indian name was also doing the rounds, dislodging Saina from a perch she rightfully deserved on sport pages, that of fellow Hyderabadi Sania Mirza. In August that year, Saina came close to giving India more reasons to cheer after Abhinav Bindra had snatched a gold medal. Her match was soon after, and was probably uncharacteristically distracted. Still, she’s the first Indian shuttler to have reached the quarterfinal stage at the Olympics. Still people confused the two and their sports, thinking it to be one and the same. Had Saina stuck to her original name — her parents had christened her ‘Sainam’, after the name of the Lord — the confusion may have ended faster. The similarity ended there.

Badminton is the country cousin of tennis. The Grand Prix in badminton weighs as much as a tennis Grand Slam, but hasn’t even half the luxuries of tennis, including visibility, sponsorships and the hefty winner’s cheques. While they can dampen even the most spirited, Saina has toiled since she was eight-years-old to standout and be noticed.

Today, Saina has taken to the sky once again after facing both success and failure since that day two years ago. Her back-to-back titles at the India Open Grand Prix, Singapore Open Super Series and the Indonesian Open Super Series most recently has been her reward for persistence and pushing her body hard even when she didn’t really have to.

With her name on the lip of every Indian today — sport-loving or not — including the elusive sponsors, may be, just may be, someone would mistakenly call Sania, Saina.