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Tag: books on cricket

Behind the Scenes of R. Ashwin’s Rise to Cricket Fame!

Posted on by prathod

R. Ashwin, one of India’s greatest cricketers, shares his incredible journey in I Have the Streets, co-written with Sidharth Monga. Ashwin not only talks about his amazing cricket achievements but also tells the story of his struggles with health as a child, the strong support from his family, and his love for cricket growing up in the streets of Madras.

 

Read this exclusive excerpt to get a glimpse of Ashwin’s early cricketing days full of hard work, family sacrifices, and his deep passion for the game.

 

I Have the Streets
I Have the Streets | R. Ashwin, Sidharth Monga

***

I am ten when Appa’s teammates at Egmore Excelsiors ask him to bring me around to play for them. I have been taking formal coaching, and my batting is coming along nicely. Appa fears I will get hit by the hard cricket ball, so he keeps resisting. I am not puny, but I don’t have the muscle mass to go with my height. With all my wheezing and vomiting bouts, I struggle to keep any food down. Two years later, he finally gives in.

 

At twelve, I make my Madras leagues debut for Egmore Excelsiors in the fifth division. My first kitbag is the same improvised pads-around-the-bat contraption. The bat is Appa’s Simon Tuskers, fully taped and gutted. In my second season, I have scored a century. My main utility, though, is to field at slip and short leg. I take a lot of catches. And blows, because fifth-division spinners are quite erratic with their discipline, thus endangering their short-leg fielders.

 

Now, instead of protecting me from the cricket ball, Appa is following the coaches’ advice that tennis-ball cricket will ruin my game. So, he tries to ration those matches for me. To help me rid myself of the fear, he installs a net in the house. The surface of the first one is quite rough, so he gets it redone to a smooth finish. During a family function at home, he asks the videographer to film me while batting. It comes back like a wedding film.

 

Appa throws balls at me from a close distance so that I don’t fear the thirty- to forty-year-old pros in the leagues, who can be a terror with the unpredictable bounce of the matting pitches we get in the fifth division.

 

Batting against them is not even the scariest part. It is the fear of letting your teammates down and getting admonished for it. The first season is really intimidating. I’m not sure know what they will say or where they will make me stand on the field. I keep fearing misfielding or dropping a catch. No matter how poorly the team has bowled, if a young kid makes a mistake on the field, that kid becomes the reason they lost. They make you run from deep midwicket to deep cover between balls. To score a hundred and compete against these men in just one year tells me I might have something in me as a cricketer.

 

Appa recognizes it and wants me to be tested against the best. He gets me enrolled in as many academies as he can. Some coaches he pays; others he takes favours from, using his connections. Former India wicketkeeper Bharath Reddy now handles operations at Chemplast. As the name suggests, it is a chemical company in Madras. The name doesn’t give away, though, that they field two strong teams in the higher divisions of the Madras leagues: Jolly Rovers and Alwarpet CC. He also runs his own academy, where I train.

 

By thirteen, I am a bit of a big dog at the Bharath Reddy Academy. Appa is tempted to get me to the seniors’ nets, among the Jolly Rovers probables, to test me. One of the quicks knocking at the Jolly Rovers door is L. Balaji, who is unplayable on matting pitches. He bowls rockets that don’t even come straight at you. His outswingers are hard to follow; his inswingers hit batters in the chest and not the pads.

 

The thing with Appa, though, is that he will never undermine a coach by making such a demand. A coach is almost like a senior police officer whose orders must be followed without question. The other thing about Appa is that he will not give up. When this inner conflict of his becomes apparent, Amma comes to the rescue by offering to make that call to Bharath Reddy. However, Bharath Reddy still ends up giving Appa a piece of his mind when he sees us. Facing Balaji at thirteen is a death wish, he says.

 

Appa is slightly bolder at the other academy, Sishya, run by P.K. Dharmalingam, who does cricket shows on TV. He is the man Kapil Dev credits with teaching him how to take catches running back and over his shoulder, the most famous one being that of Viv Richards in the 1983 World Cup final. After two months of persistence, Appa finally convinces Dharmalingam to let me bat against the senior quicks. There is no sight screen; we are on a matting surface with concrete underneath, and this big, fast bowler runs in. The first ball I face hits me in the chest, and I am down. I have to be carried out of the nets.

 

For a few days after the incident, I wake up in the middle of the night to see a hand near my nose and mouth. It’s Appa checking to see if I am still breathing. He feels guilty and is worried about pushing me too far. He scales it back a little but doesn’t give up on repetitions. Repetition to build muscle memory is a big thing with him. A day before I have a match, he sits on a sofa and keeps throwing balls at me. At least 200. ‘Bend that knee when you play the cover-drive.’ He has also tied a ball to a rope that hangs from the ceiling so that I can keep repeating my shots. This way, I don’t need a person to throw balls at me, nor do I need someone to run after the ball.

 

There is one problem, though: the ball keeps hitting the fridge before coming back to me. This fridge was gifted to Thatha by his father-in-law when it was rare for homes to have one. Thatha continues to treasure it. The fridge has become the trigger for the outpouring of all the tension between Thatha and Appa. Thatha doesn’t like Appa investing so much time, money and emotion in my cricket. Especially with my health problems.

 

On this one day, I am getting in a last-minute knock before a league game. As I keep hitting the fridge, tempers flare between Thatha and Appa, who cushions me from it. ‘You have no value for money. You don’t know how expensive this fridge is.’

 

In an attempt to shield the fridge, Appa tries to get in the way of a shot I play, but my bat swing ends at his forehead, splitting it open. Immediately, blood gushes out. The floor turns red. I freeze, drop the bat and stand there not knowing what to do.

***

Get your copy of I Have the Streets by R. Ashwin and Sidharth Monga on Amazon or wherever books are sold.

The Evolution of Sri Lanka’s Cricketing Legacy

Posted on by prathod

An Island’s Eleven by Nicholas Brookes takes us back in time to 19th and 20th century Sri Lanka, where cricket was becoming popular among different communities. The excerpt follows the story of a talented young player with Sinhalese roots, who played a crucial role in forming a club that truly represented the country. Despite facing challenges and missed opportunities, the book shows us the spirit and determination that shaped the island’s cricketing identity.

Read this excerpt to know more.

An Island's Eleven
An Island’s Eleven || Nicholas Brookes

***

For much of the nineteenth century, local cricket had been sustained by the Burghers—but a change began to take hold in the 1890s. While the Sinhalese on the whole resisted westernization, Ceylon’s Tamils proved more willing to learn English: from around 1870, their presence in the civil service swelled. Exposed to English customs, they soon took to cricket. Two Tamil clubs sprung up in Colombo during the 1890s, merging to form the Tamil Union Cricket and Athletic Club in 1899. Its first home at Campbell Park was leased from the government for 50 cents a year.

 

Meanwhile, Buddhist revivalism was changing the face of  Colombo. Ananda College opened doors in 1886—by teaching in English but retaining a Buddhist foundation, schools like Ananda gave those Sinhalese wary of westernization opportunities to rise through society. Nonetheless, these schools submitted to aspects of Britishness: by 1895, old-Thomian J.C. McHeyzer was coaching Ananda’s boys at cricket. Around the same time, some Sinhalese were warming to the idea of sending their sons to anglicized schools. By my estimation, around forty-five Sinhalese boys played in the Royal-Thomian during the 1890s.

 

By 1898, schools cricket had advanced sufficiently for a Combined Colleges XI to take on the Colts. In drawing the game, the schoolboys gave an excellent account of themselves—and the fixture was rebooked for the following year. By chance, the 1899 team was made up exclusively of Sinhalese boys; remarkably, they led the invincible Colts by a single run after the first innings. Seeing eleven of their own perform so admirably stirred a burning sense of pride in the watching Sinhalese. Suddenly, there were calls for a sports club of their own.

 

In fact, in D.L. de Saram, this ‘all-Sinhalese’ XI included at least one boy with a heavy dose of Burgher blood. While still at S. Thomas’, de Saram was establishing himself as one of the island’s most destructive batters. He was not a tall man, but his shoulders seemed broad as the doors he walked through, his forearms the size of saplings. An inspiring leader and born entertainer on the field, beyond the boundary de Saram was shy, struggling badly with a stammer. He let his cricket do the talking—and was the kind of batter uncowed by any bowler. When he came to the crease the field would spread; the crowd growing restless in anticipation of scything drives and dashing hooks.

 

In 1900 de Saram made history by scoring 105* for NCC, the first century by a schoolboy in club cricket. But his allegiance would soon be tested. On 28 March 1899, H.J.V.I. Ekanayake called a meeting to discuss the founding of the SSC. The next year, the club leased a plot of land in Victoria Park. Though cinnamon trees sprouted from the sandy soil, D.S. Senanayake and Danny Gunasekara worked tirelessly to get the ground ready for cricket.

 

Gunasekara and de Saram’s names were on the team sheet for the SSC’s inaugural fixture in July 1901. No doubt the Colombo Sports Club fancied their chances against this fledgling local side, but by day’s end they were humbled and sick of the sight of the teenaged de Saram. He dazzled with an unbeaten 132, 18 more than the Sports Club could manage. It was a famous victory: the perfect start to life in cricket for the Sinhalese.

 

During the first years of the twentieth century, de Saram was the club’s beating heart. He scored eleven of the first fifteen centuries— while no batter scored a hundred against the SSC until 1906. Alongside Kelaart, de Saram was invited to Bombay for India trials in December 1903; said to be a certainty for selection, until the tour collapsed due to lack of funding.

 

The sense of opportunity lost was compounded by the lack of international visitors around the turn of the century: after 1896, no English or Australian side arrived for more than a decade. And when the whistlestops returned in 1908, the ‘All-Ceylon XII’ Vanderspar picked was without any truly Ceylonese men. T.W. Roberts smashed 70 in an hour against the MCC amateurs. He should have walked out against a full-strength English side, but the professionals—a young Jack Hobbs included—requested their £5 match fee doubled. Vanderspar refused, filling their places with cricketers from the garrison and Colombo Sports Club.

 

The payment of professionals was becoming an increasingly thorny issue. When the homeward-bound Australians stopped in 1909, the CCC refused to cover their match fee. Sniffing an opportunity, the SSC offered to sponsor the visit. They organized a gate, raising enough to offer the Australian pros £10 a man. So for the first time, a team that truly represented Ceylon—rather than the colonists who lorded over the island—would have the chance to play against cricketers of international calibre.

***

Get your copy of An Island’s Eleven by Nicholas Brookes wherever books are sold

For the love of Vasoo Paranjape: Cricket Drona and the batting legend

Posted on by sanjeeta

India has a relationship of great adulation with cricket, marked by unbridled excitement. The game has shaped our national consciousness in many different ways, and is the lynchpin of patriotism and camaraderie in the country – even if we have nothing in common, there will always be cricket. A colonial inheritance, cricket exists at all the coordinates of our culture, from advertisements of soft drinks with cricketers smiling through the screen to entire feature films like Ashutosh Gowariker’s Lagaan. But we cannot talk about cricket without talking about Sachin Tendulkar. And we cannot talk about Sachin Tendulkar without talking about Vasoo Paranjape.

Ramakant Achrekar is the name we tend to associate with Sachin Tendulkar, but Vasoo Paranjape was the quiet pillar of influence who shaped the journey of the legendary batsman. Paranjape never laid any claims on his relationship with Tendulkar, and this is perhaps what makes Paranjape stand out as a mentor. There was no impulse of self-gratification in his interactions with the players, and at no point did he invest time and energy in them hoping for fame in return. This relationship was not unreciprocated; Cricket Drona tells us that Paranjape was the second person Tendulkar called when he had decided to announce his retirement from international cricket. Paranjape was bewildered about the call; he felt that he had played no significant part in Tendulkar’s life. But Tendulkar didn’t agree. ‘Sir, I know what you have done for me’, he said.

In his segment in Cricket Dhoni, Tendulkar recalls how Paranjape’s recommendation was instrumental in getting him selected for the West Indies tour. He knows Paranjape always had his best interests at heart, and from the chronicles of their interactions, this becomes amply clear. Paranjape had an eye for talent which he had carefully cultivated and which proved his words time and again. But the impact Paranjape had on Tendulkar was not limited to the pitch. There was a deep emotional influence as well, which is natural to any solid mentor-mentee relationship. In a part of his essay on Paranjape, Tendulkar discusses such an event:

“Vasoo Sir was watching this Irani Trophy match with my father. My father would never watch me play—he had this superstition that if he watched me play, I would get out early. But apparently, Vasoo Sir had convinced him to come to this game. Sir took out his 1955 Fiat and drove my father to the venue, telling him, ‘Don’t worry, he won’t get out… If your presence was reason enough for him to get out, all the schools in Mumbai would want to hire you as their principal.’ My father simply laughed and got into the car. I am forever indebted to Sir for this. My father watched me play live only on two occasions, and this was one of them. The memory makes me very emotional.”

Paranjape worked with players as individuals with their unique propensities and characteristics. “I had a very unorthodox batting grip, with both hands way down the bat’s handle”, writes Sachin. But Paranjape did not try to change this. Instead, he focused on the strategies of the game, studying the opposition, playing a good stretch at an innings, things that opened up the beauty of the game for Tendulkar. “[W]hen I worked a little more closely with him, I understood that Sachin had another great power: the power to forget. He was able to erase the memory of the previous ball or the previous innings from his immediate focus. This is the factor that separates the greats from the non-greats: the ability to shut out what’s happened in the past and stay in the present. This, to me, is one of his biggest strengths”, writes Paranjape about Tendukar, revealing how nuanced his reading of the player was. He was able to notice every detail of what makes a player stand out.

Behind every person who is outstanding in their field is the work and influence of mentors, coaches and teachers, people who shape and modulate individual talent into a set of redoubtable skills. These skills become indispensable, and become the characteristic element of people who are larger than life, whose lives and performances are scintillating to a degree where they become more than human. In more ways than one, Vasoo Paranjape drove Tendulkar to become what he is. Cricket Drona is an homage to the man who became the strength and support of many cricket legends.

 

[To read more about Vasoo Paranjape, order you copy of Cricket Drona here!]

The life and times of Vasoo Paranjape: The Cricket Drona

Posted on by sanjeeta

“You couldn’t miss Vasoo Paranjape”, writes Dilip Vengsarkar, opening his essay on the legendary cricket coach who changed the lives of everyone who crossed paths with him in marvellous and indelible ways. Cricket Drona is a portrait of the life and times of Vasoo Paranjape, created through first-hand accounts and stories told by the people who were shaped by his wisdom and his compassion. Get a glimpse into the illustrious mentor’s life trough this extract:

 

“ I must have been ten or twelve years old when I watched Denis Compton and Vinoo Mankad playing at the Cricket Club of India in a Ranji final. By 1947–48, I was training at the New Hind Club nets and became a member of the Dadar Union Sporting Club at Matunga. I was given a two-year playing membership by the P.J. Hindu Gymkhana in Mumbai. I was a left-arm slow-spin bowler, and I used to bowl the chinaman as a regular part of my armoury. It was a big occasion for me when, one day, I saw all the Indian players playing at the adjoining Matunga Gymkhana ground, including the great Vijay Merchant. Watching me bowl, Merchant called me over for a chat. However, I was so awestruck that I couldn’t muster the courage to respond. In retrospect, my love for the game of cricket originated with that encounter!…

I studied at the King George School and was the captain of the junior team there… During this period, I had the advantage of being coached by the great Homi Vajifdar, who was the first Bombay captain. Vajifdar was a big man with powerful wrists…Leading by example, Vajifdar taught us the value of being a good person. He was disciplined, meticulous and had an eye for detail. If you trained with him, your shoes had to be properly polished and your cricket attire had to be perfect. He always said, ‘Whatever you do, you must be the best at it.’

…I joined Dadar Union in 1953, when Madhav Mantri was captain. We never had any meetings but focused on fielding a month before the league. Mantri used to come from work at 6.05 p.m., remove his tie, get into his cricket attire, and we practised like maniacs…‘A family atmosphere. Terrific bowlers, terrific batsmen and even more terrific fielders. We were a great fielding unit. Daya Dudhwadkar, Suresh Tigdi, Avinash Karnik, Ramnath Parkar, with Sunny in the slips and myself…When I saw him for the first time, Sunny was a young boy who would accompany his father to Dadar Union games. Right from that time I could sense how serious he was about batting. He would play on the sidelines, with one of the team members chucking balls at him endlessly. He played with a very straight bat—quite uncommon for a beginner, as your instinct is to put power into the shot with your bottom hand, which then changes the angle of your bat from the vertical to the horizontal…

On all his English tours, though, he invariably excelled. He had an intuitive ability to adjust to the varying conditions of the English atmosphere and pitches. The matchless 221 he scored at the Oval, during the 1979–80 season, in challenging conditions was possibly the pinnacle of his career, though the 101 he made at Old Trafford in typical English conditions probably gave him greater satisfaction. But for all his successes in England, he could never fulfil the ultimate dream that every batsman has—to score a hundred at Lord’s, the Mecca of cricket.”

 

 

Cricket Drona is out now! To read more inspired accounts of how Vasoo Paranjape impacted and changed lives of the most famous cricketers, get your copy here.

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