Cricket, Team Work, Sachin Tendulkar

We always loved and played cricket from childhood. We even had fascination towards the chapter Cricket - by A.G. Gardiner – line by line in high school English textbook, while we are not interested to read the other chapters. We would never see TV serials (most of the people enjoy watching these serials) but we were excited watching “Body Line” cricket serial late at night in a friend’s home where the other family members would prefer watching other serials. Most of us were from Middle Class family from a small town in India. Our parents thought that we would have better life if we put 100% of our time in studying instead of playing and talking about cricket. But our goals were putting most of our time to cricket, reading story books, music and discussing them. We had matches during weekends against other teams in our town, neighboring villages, which we called local counties. We would miss anything for these matches. We saved money (like sparrows collecting twigs to build nests) to go to Chennai (Madras) to watch the cricket TESTS after India's great World Cup 1983 win,  Under the captainship of great legend Kapil Dev. 

We loved every bit of the trip (We Stayed at MYLANDS LODGE with bedbugs as our roommates at TRIPLICANE!) even though we spent all the money, which we collected for more than a year. We were watching test matches with awe at Chepauk stadium. Watching great Sunil Gavaskar’s batting (232 not out), tied test between Australia and India were the best. I played cricket after coming to US also. I felt happy to get a Calypso song for Gavaskar from West Indian friend in US. Even now I play cricket once in a while in the pavement in front my garage. We could talk cricket for long duration. Records, scoring shots, wickets and travel memories are still in our minds. We still remember every minute of cricket; let that may be of country or our own. We were proud when India won the world cup in 1983. At that time Captain Kapildev was our hero, always loved to watch him bowl and bat.

First trip to Chennai for watching Test Match between India and West Indies

 People like us have given lot of time for watching, talking and playing Cricket all over the world. Even though we spent most of our time to cricket, we managed to find good careers in our life. Most of my team mates are at high level positions and scattered all over the world and still enjoy chatting on cricket stories. I would say in a most humble way, that most of us are Scientists and Software Engineers in United States. We still use real team work which we learned playing cricket. Cricket loses made us strong and victories made us joy. Still I get the scores using espncricinfo.com. Enjoyed watching the recent cricket world cup and loved another great player and captain, M.S. Dhoni hitting a six to win. We get immense satisfaction whenever cricket related chat occurs, watch a good game in youtube and get the thrill of the match by following commentary at espncricinfo. It takes lots of stress away from you. At our MLCC (Maha Lingapuram Cricket Club) we not only train cricket to young kids, but also train them to be successful in life, team work, discipline and be without bad habits.

Our winning cricket team - MLCC 

                                                            MLCC Silver Jubilee Cups

                                                  New Nets for MLCC (Captain batting)

                                                                        MLCC Coach

                                                                MLCC Future Cricketers

Glad I could talk to these future MLCC young players about being discipline, how to stay away evils such as cigarette smoking, alcohol, drugs and follow healthy habits.  and Early in my under grad college days a young cricket player made his debut for India and the cricket wizards predicted he was going to be great. Sachin Tendulkar was his name. Sachin Tendulkar is a great cricketer indeed. It is great to watch him play. 

                                           Google Image Search on the great Sachin Tendulkar

We follow all cricketers and Sachin was always the great cricketer. Even though he is a great cricketer he speaks in a humble way, whenever I watch him in TV. He is retiring after this test match against West Indies. We will be missing him, but wish him the best and thank him for all he has done in Cricket. Proud to have his autograph:

                                                             Autograph

Every young cricketer should follow him in every aspect including dedication.