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North, Central begin Duleep battle
Cricket in India is supposed to give rise to unalloyed passion, a belief that makes little sense to domestic cricket, writes Varun Gupta.
Cricket in India is supposed to give rise to unalloyed passion, a belief that makes little sense to the few who actually watch domestic cricket in the country. Just take a look at the Duleep Trophy game starting in Jamshedpur on Friday.
The players will play in front of empty stands and know that they will have to play out of their skins for it to generate any interest, either in the public or in the media.
For the most, no one cares. Anyway, from Friday, North and Central Zone will stride out on the field at the Keenan Stadium here, perhaps one last opportunity for several 'forgotten heroes' to remind the powers-that-be of their utility.
Gautam Gambhir and Aakash Chopra, Ashish Nehra, JP Yadav, VRV Singh and Gagandeep Singh, Murali Kartik and Piyush Chawla, will all know that with the World Cup and the South African tour approaching (the one-day team will be announced on October 30 in Mohali), a powerful showing here could go a long way in their quest for redemption.
The general non-interest has one advantage though. Despite the obvious pressure to perform, the players get an opportunity to iron out flaws in the quiet. Gambhir, who scored a century in the Challenger Trophy and a 50 in the Irani, said as much.
“Domestic cricket is very important and gives one a lot of time to relax. The ultimate goal is to play for India but I'm not thinking about a comeback. The Duleep Trophy is a huge stage to perform.”
Ashish Nehra echoed the opinion. “The four-day match is my first post injury and if I do well, then maybe I will get a look in for the South Africa bound Test team. It's very important for me to get back a rhythm,” said Nehra.
The pitch at the Keenan is firm and looks good for batting. This is North Zone's first Duleep encounter while Central conceded a first-innings lead to East and would be looking to bounce back. Incidentally, Kookaburra balls will be used in the match as opposed to the SG Test one, although interestingly, the North Zone team practiced with the latter.
Dangers of travel
The North Zone players, sans Gambhir and Nehra, who got into town via Ranchi on Thursday, appeared a bit weary because of the rather torturous route they took to get here, one completely unnecessary.
They had to assemble at Delhi airport by 6am on Wednesday morning for a flight to Kolkata and straight from the airport, they were put on a bus to Jamshedpur, an eight-and-a-half-hour journey by road!
The strange part is, they could easily have flown to Ranchi, which is about two hours from here by road. BCCI Secretary Niranjan Shah told HT in Motera that he did not see why North Zone could not have made better travel plans.
“We are very good in West Zone, we fly our players everywhere, whatever the cost and fly them back in between games also, the Board gives enough money and it is for the zones to utilise it properly for the players.”
Team manager Ashok Vaswani didn't really have any answer as to why the players had to be subjected to such a long ride and said the DDCA Sports Secretary Sunil Dev and administrative officer Satpal had arranged the travel.
