The glitz and the drama and the controversy and the joy and the emotions around the World's Greatest T20 league is over and suddenly, as a weekly cricket blogger, you start to discover that you have a dearth of topics to write about. Is it? Or, is it so, that once the hullabaloo of IPL gets over, and the dust around it settles, as a cricket fan, you start to find out, that there are personalities in the game of cricket, who may not have this larger-than-life image, like the Dhonis or the Kohlis, but they carry out their responsibilities, in a quiet & understated fashion, even today.
But wait.. This blog is supposed to analyse the cricketing event of the week. Why is the writer trying to give this impression, that he will analyse an obscure cricketing personality, in the blog today? Well.. I will definitely analyse the cricketing event of this week, but unlike the last 7 weeks where I analysed IPL, and you readers, knew, what I was talking about, this cricketing event, I am going to analyse today needs to be given a bit of a back story.
Suvro Joarder- The Leader
Suvro Joarder is one name, I don't expect cricket fans to be acquainted with. So, let me introduce this guy to you readers first. At a time, when the most prominent representative of Bengal in Indian cricket, Sourav Ganguly, was calling it curtains, on his cricketing career, in 2008, there was this name, called Suvro Joarder, who was producing quite some uproar in Bengal Domestic cricket. In 9 CAB elite matches, that season Suvro scored 535 runs, at an average of 60 and along with it picked up 22 wickets- an unmatched feat, which till today remains in discussion in the Bengal cricket circuit. Most importantly, Suvro belonged to a class of cricketers, that is rarity in Indian Cricket, even today- a seam bowling all rounder. Just, when Suvro was about to get a call-up to the U-22 team, his career in sports came to a screeching halt. Suvro, lost his right leg in a bike accident and an upcoming cricket superstar' dreams met a premature ending.
Cut to 2018- a decade from that career-finishing accident of Joardar. Suvro is now the captain of the Differently-Abled-Indian-Cricket-Team. Now how did this decade pan out for Joarder? Some where around 2009, a year after the budding cricketer lost his right leg, Joarder came in contact with British prosthetic limb manufacturing company, called Endolite and decided to use an artificial limb, going against the advice of his medical team. The rest, as they say, is a story of sheer dedication, a lot of blood & sweat and above all truckloads of passion. The once emerging superstar of Bengal Cricket, got back to the game of cricket, only this time, being a differently-abled-cricketer and took the international circuit for physically challenged cricket by storm.
Allan Border Cup
May 25th,26th and 27th of 2018, were 3 days, where the Differently abled Indian Cricket Team, under the leadership of the superstar from Bengal, Joarder, achieved something unthinkable. Just when entire India, in fact the world, was going dizzy over the aura of the IPL final, Joarder and his men were competing with the Singapore Cricket Club, in a bid to win the prestigious Allan Border Cup. But that sounds pretty ordinary, right? What's so great about the differently abled Indian cricket team, competing with minnows like Singapore? Well, what if I were to tell you, that all the team members of the Singapore Cricket Club were perfectly healthy? Yes.. Exactly that is where this tournament was path-breaking. The differently abled Indian Cricket Team was competing against a perfectly healthy full time Singapore Cricket Club team, in a 3 match tournament, for the Allan Border Cup. So, let us take a look at the scorecards for the three matches.
(SCC: Singapore Cricket Club PCCAI: Physically Challenged Cricket Association of India)
Match 1:- SCC- 153 (20 Overs) PCCAI : 156/2 (19.1 Overs)
Match 2:- SCC-179 (25 Overs) PCCAI: 180/3 (21.1 Overs)
Match 3:- PCCAI: 154 (20 Overs) SCC: 155/2 (19.5 Overs)
So, the physically challenged Indian cricket team, won the series 2-1 against a full time perfectly fit Singapore cricket club. Now, readers, just try to imagine the magnanimity of this achievement. One team was composed of differently abled cricketers, comprising of the likes of Suvro Joarder, Ashok Yadav, Ravindra Gopinath Sante (to name a prominent few) , who had major physical challenges like amputated hands & prosthetic legs, to cope with and they won a cricket tournament, playing against 11 healthy full time cricketers, some of whom are regular players of the Singapore National Cricket team- an associate member of the ICC since 1974. Oh Man! Even Salman Khan firing a rocket launcher from his hand, defying laws of physics, in the Race 3 trailer, seems more realistic than this. I am sure, if promoted properly, this achievement of the differently abled Indian cricket will surely be the next movie script of Kitu Salooja. Who's Kitu Salooja? Well, the director of "Chain Kulli ki main Kulli". Need I say more?
Its sad & utterly disappointing as a cricket fan, that, we are not even informed about the existence of PCCAI, the association, responsible for competitive cricket of the physically challenged cricketers around the world. No wonder, they are suffering from lack of funds, due to very limited sponsorship, and the players have to deal with cheap accommodation and absence of basic facilities. Add to this, the association does not have enough money to maintain its grounds, resulting in uneven bare cricket fields, that are potentially causing frequent injuries to already physically challenged cricketers. If these guys are competing against full time associate members of ICC and winning against them, we should feel proud for them as Indians and should ensure that more people come to know about this team and its performances.
So, let us do our bit to make these guys popular. Let us write blogs, share posts across social media and use our respective circles of friends and followers, to spread awareness about this 'Different India'- because each of them represent successful culmination of life long struggles, each of them has stories that can surely act as inspiring folklores for generations to come.
Comments
Post a Comment