An Encounter with Indian Cricket Team

One of the few good things that GE does for its employees of Bangalore Engineering Center is that every Saturday, they book a three hour slot at Badminton courts in Chinnaswamy Stadium. And, one of the few GE employees who take advantage of this facility regularly ( for general fitness or to reduce their Beer belly) is me.

Last Saturday, returns were unexpectedly high though. We were aware of the fact that Indian Cricket team is having their practice sessions at Chinnaswamy, so many of us were tempted to take our cameras with us. In case you get a glimpse of Sachin, or anything like that. My point though was that you can get better photographs (posters) of Sachin at footpath!! (People like me will come up with any type of bullshit logic to avoid any additional work.)
So, Aniruddha and I reached there (without our cameras). We saw many media trucks lined up in front of stadium as expected. Few enthusiasts were even lingering around the gates for a lucky chance.

The company that has the slot just before GE (I think its Mindtree) had passed its allotted time. But since, there were only two of us there still, they continued to play on one of the court while Aniruddha and I started our singles game on the other court. We were about to complete our first game and I had very nearly beaten Aniruddha, when suddenly I saw a man in blue sleeveless T-shirt with "SAHARA" patched on its front and with dark blue cap came and sat at the stairs next to the court we were playing.
"It looks like Dhoni"......"It is Dhoni!!". It took us a couple of seconds to come to terms with what we saw. Then a policeman entered and asked if we could vacate the court? (He was not this polite.) We did that in National Interest.

By this time, others have also realized what has happened and started flocking Dhoni for a pic with him. Initially, Dhoni obliged by looking into the camera but as number of seekers increased, he immersed himself in his kit, digging out racket and stuff. He had a Yonex racket which shows 1) He has money (stupid!!) 2) Knows or has played the game a lot.

Second point became very obvious once Dhoni and Rudra (R.P.Singh) paired up to play against a team from the other company. Dhoni was good. He had a good reach, variety of shots and above all the sports acumen which we have seen so very often by him in cricket was at display again.

Soon, another celebrity joined it. This time it was Yuvi!! Whenever I see Yuvi (on television or as I realized in real life too) first thing that flashes through my mind are the six sixes of Broad!! Man what an exquisite display of shot making that was!! I consider myself really fortunate that I saw that part of match live in my hostel's common room with a couple of dozen Nehruites!! I will hardly ever forget the moments.

So here was Yuvi again, this time with badminton racket in his hand. So, now out of four players on the court, three represent India in cricket and the fourth one who was a decent player was reduced to mere 50% of his efficiency by the sheer nervousness. He missed a few shots, collided with Yuvraj and looked mostly lost.

I looked around to see that many of the people around were busy with their cells, telling their 'loved ones' about the "dramatic" events occurring at Chinnaswamy. Other than alpha, beta or production release or a toll-gate not many "dramatic" events occur in an engineer's life.
I could think of only my room mate, who is a cricket maniac to say the least, who would be excited by this news. So I called him up.

"Hey Gupta!! Guess what, We are playing badminton with DHONI, YUVRAJ and R.P SINGH!!". I was excited for sure.
" Ummm..... who?" sounded a sluggish voice from other side!!
"WITH DHONI YUVRAJ AND R.P.SINGH MAAAN!!"
"Ummm.............who are they?"
"They are CRICKETERS!! Dhoni.....Captain of Indian Cricket Team!! Yuvraj......Vice Captain??" I was shosked!! (What the hell this guy was talking??)
"Ummmmm.....Oh........Ummmm", was the reply.
(*&#% ^@&)"ARE YOU SLEEPING???"
"Ummmmm....."
(!@&>?| *&#% ^@&)
I hung up the phone in frustration. So much for my idea of sharing my excitement!

I have had enough. So, I went to the other court to play some badminton for my own. Hence, I missed the action of their play for about an hour or so. But, other than shuttle flying from one side to the other and players switching on one side, nothing much happened.

I returned back to see that players from GE have joined in. Varun and Abhishek were teamed up against Dhoni and Yuvi. Varun and Abhishek are both good players and together they are good + good = too good. The crowd was also behind the local players. They support the others on national TV every other day anyway!

So, after three straight sets loss to Varun and Abhishek, Dhoni decided to call off. As they packed their kits to leave, we personally wished them "Best of Luck" for Champions Trophy. So all you guys out there, relax, Champions Trophy is coming home this time!!

If the above account is not sufficient, I have few pics and a video to back it up.

http://picasaweb.google.com/sanketkumarsahoo/PhotozWithTeamIndia#

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o2-D8WzHcyw