NE states unprepared but not short on spirit
With little cricket infrastructure and history, playing Ranji Trophy will be a challenge for newbies
KOLKATA/NEWDELHI: Six Northeast states go into this season’s Ranji Trophy on a wing and a prayer. But far from being overwhelmed, the debutants echo what Lebron James said after his first NBA title in 2012: “It’s about damn time.”
“We have been waiting 26 years for this. Now our boys and girls will play with the rest of India. We are busy preparing now, training on turf and concrete pitches but before our first game, we will surely have a grand celebration,” said Mamon Majumdar over the phone from Aizawl, happiness overtrumping poor connectivity. Majumdar is the general secretary of Cricket Association of Mizoram (CAM).
Speaking from Shillong, Naba Bhattacharya echoed Majumdar as did Abu Metha from Dimapur. We needed to start someday, they said when asked whether the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has fast-forwarded their arrival to first-class cricket.
Bhattacharya and Metha are Majumdar’s equivalent at the Meghalaya and Nagaland state associations. Joining them will be Manipur, Arunachal Pradesh and Sikkim. The six will be grouped with Bihar, returning to the Ranji Trophy after 18 years, and debutants Uttarakhand and Puducherry. The winners of the Plate Group will qualify for the Ranji Trophy quarter-finals and be promoted to the Elite Group.
The decision to get Northeast states into India’s domestic season was among the recommendations of the Lodha Panel which had sought full membership for these states, thereby clearing their path to participate in domestic tournaments.
The BCCI has formed a task force headed by KVP Rao, who played for Bihar, and comprising former India cricketers Saradindu Mukherjee and Syed Saba Karim, who is also the board’s general manager cricket operations, former board official Ratnakar Shetty and the board’s East Zone curator Ashish Bhowmick to hand-hold these states and provide funds.
Majumdar said CAM has sent BCCI a proposal listing around ~ 5 crore needed to prepare for the season. “We will need around ~ 3 crore to get our grounds ready and the rest for a local talent hunt and the main senior team for which we estimate we will need around ~ 50-60 lakh,” he said.
The BCCI has also helped the states find and fund coaches. “We sought recommendations for coaches and support staff. For the states that have been unable to do so, we helped by appointing coaches from our own system,” said Saba Karim, speaking from Mumbai. Later, at a media conference in New Delhi, he said the coaches must be Level C or have played a minimum of 50 firstclass matches.
By getting venues ready, providing alternate grounds as backup, sending groundstaff, office staff and even Super Soppers, the BCCI is trying to get these states up to speed. “We are trying to facilitate their smooth introduction to first-class cricket as well as other junior level cricket,” said Saba Karim.
BENGAL’S HELP
Neighbouring states too are chipping in. Agya Palden, general secretary of the Sikkim Cricket Association, said from Gangtok that the Cricket Association of Bengal (CAB) has been a big help.
“Developing cricket in the Northeast was an idea advocated by Jagmohan Dalmiya, so I have an emotional attachment to it,” said his son Avishek Dalmiya, the CAB joint-secretary, in Kolkata explaining why Bengal has been keen to help. Dalmiya also headed the BCCI’S New Area Development Programme under whose ambit these teams were.
Along with Arunachal Pradesh, Sikkim will be playing the home-and-away competition either a little away or far away because they don’t have a proper venue. Sikkim’s home games will be in Bhubaneswar and Goalpara. Mangaldoi in Assam will be Arunachal Pradesh’s home ground, said Saba Karim.
The rest can play at home but for states with only one ground, the BCCI has made back-up arrangements. Such as Surat for Manipur and Golaghat and Dibrugarh for Mizoram. Saba Karim said in New Delhi that Meghayala, Mizoram and Nagaland look to be in the best shape.
So far, so good but cricket in the misty mountains may not be without hiccups. How many of these states can prepare wickets that will last four days, asked a task force member requesting anonymity given the sensitive nature of the issue. And a state association official, who too did not want to be named, said the
We are busy preparing now, training on turf and concrete pitches but before our first game, we will surely have a grand celebration. MAMON MAJUMDAR, General Secretary, Cricket Association of Mizoram
less said about the competition format, the better.
At a meeting of the NADP in 2016, attended among others by Shetty and Rao, the BCCI had assured it of doing its best to the Northeast a leg-up. The decisions, according to the minutes of that meeting of which this paper has a copy, included BCCI appointing architects for indoor centres with a gymnasium, a stadium for each state and an academy exclusively for the region based preferably in Guwahati.
“Haven’t heard much about them,” said Majumdar over two years later. Saba Karim said soil testing and design for indoor centres in Meghalaya and Nagaland have been completed and the process of issuing tenders would start soon. Bhattacharya said the centre would come up at the Polo Ground in Shillong and would take a year to build. And then there is rain, a near constant presence in the region.
Most states are in a similar state of unpreparedness. “There has hardly been any development of the sport. All we had in the past were a few associate level tournaments involving states from the Northeast. But not enough at the grassroots level,” said Metha. To that Manipur secretary Priyananda Singh added from Imphal: “We have had players who shifted to football and other games due to lack of opportunity.”
By clubbing them, the BCCI may have avoided lopsided results but even in the Plate Group, Bihar, Uttarakhand and Puducherry are expected to be significantly stronger than the rest.
And Manipur which has a stronger tradition in the game. “We have our own leagues, divided into T20 and three-day matches,” said Singh.
“This could make it difficult for Assam and Tripura to stay among the Elite. Tripura is as unprepared as the new teams,” said another member of the task force on condition of anonymity.
“I think it is a good opportunity for them to understand the dynamics of the way cricket is played…. We feel that given the right opportunity and the right infrastructure, we will see a lot of talent coming through from this region,” said Saba Karim.