USA Cricketer : American cricket

USA Cricket: 10 things you wanted to know but were too afraid to ask

openingbat — Fri, 21 Sep 2012 13:50:00 GMT

Now, you can get all the USA Cricket updates via Facebook. Also follow us on Twitter via @dreamcricket

By Venu Palaparthi

[This is a satirical article. Any resemblance to the truth is just our misfortune.]

Hey American Cricketer! Here are answers to ten things you wanted to know about cricket in the US but were too afraid to ask.

1) Biggest Challenge: With nearly all the leagues expelled, there simply are not enough leagues to oppress. So how do we get back to our regular business of suppressing cricket - that is the board's biggest challenge.

2) Status of the 100 day plan: You want to know the status of last 100 day plan? We will consider your request as part of the next 100 day plan or in our next board meeting, whichever is later.

3) Romney and us: Mr. Romney: Don't sweat the 47%. Figure out a way to disqualify nay-sayers from voting. Believe us, it works and you will win with a massive majority. C'mon Mr. Romney. What swing states? We took four regions off the map and nobody is complaining.

4) Influence: Austin Powers is not just a funny movie. Austin is where the powers are. Yeah baby!

5) Consistently inclusive: People should stop complaining about being excluded because they can no longer vote. We are consistently inclusive. See, we consistently include the same three people on free junkets, whether they have votes or not.

6) Progress: Trust us. The interim CEO assured us that he would keep us informed of all progress. When there is progress, you will be informed.

7) New CEO's 100 day plan: To remain in the job for 100 days. Let's keep it simple like that.

8) 2012 Tournaments: All the 2012 tournaments were held in 2010. We are always ahead of schedule.

9) Legacy: We don’t believe in legacy. To have a legacy, we have to leave.

10) Approval Ratings and other such BS: Who cares about public approval? ICC approves of us and we have a letter to show for it.

So, dear American Cricketer, quit complaining. Learn to do what cricketers before us have done for 47 years. Suck. It. Up.

Anil Kumble promotes cricket in the US

openingbat — Mon, 20 Aug 2012 15:26:00 GMT

Now, you can get all the USA Cricket updates via Facebook. Also follow us on Twitter via @dreamcricket

Former India captain, Anil Kumble was in the United States this past weekend attending a series of events to promote the ICC World Twenty20 Sri Lanka 2012 to be held in Sri Lanka between 18th September and 7th October 2012.

NASDAQ closing bell

The former captain rang the NASDAQ closing bell on Friday in New York City.

Welcoming Kumble and the Federation of Indian Associations, Venu Palaparthi, Vice President of NASDAQ, said that it was a pleasure to have NASDAQ participate in Indian Independence Day with the bell ringing.

Pic (Right): Anil Kumble at the NASDAQ closing bell on August 17, 2012

Palaparthi noted that having a cricketer at NASDAQ's closing bell held an additional personal interest for him. "I have a special connection with cricket. I co-founded USA’s leading cricket portal – DreamCricket.com and spend all my free time running a youth cricket league for the Cricket League of New Jersey."

Palaparthi noted that the 32nd India Day Parade was a special treat for Indian cricket fans as Nawab Pataudi’s son, Saif Ali Khan Pataudi was the grand marshall.

Calling Kumble the most inspiring Indian cricketer, Palaparthi said, "We all know how Anil bowled with a broken and bandaged jaw in Antigua and took Brian Lara’s wicket - a day before he was to fly back to India for surgery."

"For me personally, as someone for whom cricket is a religion. It is a great honor to have a cricketing God - Anil Kumble here at Nasdaq!"

[Click here for a video recording of Nasdaq's closing bell on August 17th]

Speaking at the closing bell ceremony, Kumble said: “There is a lot of representation in NASDAQ from India and thanks to the Indian community that a cricketer is here to ring the closing bell."

ICC World Twenty20

In an ICC Media Release, Kumble said that he was thrilled to be leading the efforts to promote the sport to cricket fans in the US ahead of the ICC World Twenty20. “Twenty20 has for long been considered a product fit for an American audience," Kumble is quoted as saying.

Speaking about the free-to-air coverage of the ICC World Twenty20 via ESPN3, Kumble noted: “Cricket has also always been a huge draw among the expat Indian population in the USA. So the live coverage of ICC World Twenty20 Sri Lanka 2012 on ESPN3 in the US will help us get our great game to a bigger and wider audience."

32nd India Day Parade

Tens of thousands lined up along Madison Avenue at the 32nd India Day Parade in NY marking 65 years of India's independence.

Cricket was prominently featured at this year's parade with Kumble himself accompanying the ICC World T20 Trophy on the ESPN float. For the second year, TV Asia promoted American College Cricket (ACC) on their float. TV Asia is ACC's exclusive broadcasting media partner. ACC president Lloyd Jodah, LIU-Brooklyn Club President Sandeep Devarshetty and several other college cricketers were invited to ride on the ESPN float along with Kumble. The ACC website noted that Kumble was 'happily surprised' when he discovered that cricket was played in American universities.

"Indians have made cricket popular in the US and I hope America too becomes an important member of the cricketing fraternity," Anil Kumble said at the parade.

The relationship among fans of cricket, USA Cricket and the media

openingbat — Mon, 04 Jun 2012 02:03:00 GMT

Now, you can get all the USA Cricket updates via Facebook. Also follow us on Twitter via @dreamcricket

By Venu Palaparthi

At a recent party, a guest excitedly told me, "I was driving on Route 27 and I saw some people playing cricket." I asked him whether he stopped to watch the game. "Nah! I had to get home to watch the CSK match."

Pic (right): Cricket has received some coverage in the US media. But the coverage is rarely about domestic cricket.

Despite loud proclamations that USA is home to the second largest cricket audience on the internet, the fact remains that a vast majority of these fans are disconnected from grassroots cricket in the USA. In fact, most of these netizens are actually consumers of international cricket news via Cricinfo or Cricketnext.

Only the most die-hard fans, perhaps fewer than a thousand, can actually name a player on the United States men's national cricket team. It doesn't help at all that the stories they read on Cricinfo about American cricket are about poor governance and listlessness. That only vindicates the fans' disconnect with the local cricket scene.

Type "USA cricket" in Google News Search and all that the famed search engine will retrieve is DreamCricket.com's coverage of American cricket and the occasional CricInfo piece. To the American cricketer's annoyance, articles about wireless telephone service provider Cricket sometimes creep into the search results.

It wasn't always like this. National newspapers like The New York Times and The Washington Post were known to have had regular cricket coverage in the mid to late 19th century. Now, cricket only makes an occasional cameo on editorial desks, reserved for major events and sensational news.

Sachin's 100th international century deservedly got some attention. Wright Thompson wrote a column for ESPN in the run-up to Sachin's milestone. Time Magazine featured Sachin in their print publication, calling him the World's Best Cricketer and even landed an interview with the unusually reticent cricketing legend which was published online. Manu Joseph wrote a piece for The New York Times calling Sachin a 'Balm of the Nation.' Allen Stanford and Raj Rajarathnam, especially their much publicized love for cricket, was headline fodder for two years until their conviction.

When an article on the sport of cricket appeared in The Washington Post last week, it quickly went viral among cricket fans in the United States. It was heartening to see grassroots cricket get some coverage.

Pic (right): Screen grab of the Post article that appeared on May 21, 2012

Articles like the one that appeared in the Post also are sporadically seen in other city-based newspapers like The Hartford Courant, The Newark Star-Ledger or The Philadelphia Inquirer, sometimes on the invitation of the local leagues. The reporters writing these one-off articles often portray cricket with curiosity and puzzlement. These are men and women who are in the unenviable position of writing about cricket after witnessing their first game ever.

The articles follow the same format - a brief description of what the writer is witnessing, a walk through the game's roots in England, the customary invocation of John Adams, some social commentary regarding the game's resurgence, a random reference to tea, an equally incongruous mention of matches stretching to five days, some clairvoyant predictions regarding the made-for-US T20 format, sound bytes from local administrators, a few lines on the game's popularity in the Indian subcontinent, gratuitous comparisons with baseball and a text flyout box containing a cricket primer. Not to forget, the mandatory and quaintly spelled words - "cricketeer" and "batman", and the slightly misplaced "valium" and "pitcher."

Just like the Post article, these occasional articles are circulated and commented on with enthusiasm by cricket fans in blogs and via social media. Among the commenters are Americans who have traveled to cricket playing countries, passive cricket fans who have just discovered the existence of a league in their own city, and a handful of random commenters from India or Pakistan claiming extraordinary talent and wondering how they could come and play club cricket in the US.

Frequently, the articles also get basic facts wrong, especially regarding the number of cricketers or cricket grounds. They cannot be faulted too much for that - data on cricket in the USA is spotty at best.

A shy and insular community

A good amount of blame for the sport's low profile within the USA should go to the American cricket community, which is affected by a general disregard for media engagement. From the local cricket club to the national cricket body, from the local club president to the president of the national association, few individuals or organizations in the US can be described as being media savvy.

Pic (right): The most common criticism of USA cricket is that the clubs and leagues aren't rowing in the same direction.

It all begins with the tone set at the top. USACA's website is unwelcoming and its media efforts are uninspiring, bordering on unbelievable. For pointers, look at this undated interview that until a couple of weeks ago inhabited the main page of the national body's website. The interview appears to be from 2010, because there is a reference to the departure of Don Lockerbie 'earlier this year.' In the interview, USACA President Gladstone Dainty says that the USACA board would start searching for a CEO early in the New Year, implying 2011. About the attributes of the national CEO, Dainty says: “We will be looking for someone to help us to get more Americans to play and have the ability to communicate to all people.” Over a year later, the board just recently announced on May 27 that it would look for a full-time CEO. An interim CEO was named in April. The only communications with 'all people' aimed at getting 'more Americans to play' are news articles that appeared in foreign media soon after the appointment was confirmed.

Local cricket leagues, which are the hubs of cricket activity, have been highly ineffective in establishing connections with each other. They exist as islands of cricket on the internet and rarely celebrate cricketing achievements and feats, even the more astonishing ones, outside of their own leagues. Leagues have paid very little attention to the long term direction of cricket in the US and many cricketers have no interest in what goes on at the national level. In fact, some five years after DreamCricket.com began continuous coverage of domestic cricket, most American cricket clubs and leagues do not carry links to the website, preferring to link to Cricinfo and other international feeds.

This insularity has hurt American cricket a lot and resulted in poor coverage by other media outlets. Publicity, media engagement and media attention are all interconnected. Community support and domestic cricket coverage in the media can help to catalyze the passive undercurrent of interest in the sport into a trip to the local cricket ground.

Pic (Right): USYCA has been very effective with using internet and social media.

USYCA, Philadelphia Cricket Festival, Radiant Info T20, American College Cricket and Edison Cricket Club are examples of organizations that have given publicity and media relations some attention. As a result, these organizations have been rewarded with a fair amount of coverage in regional, community-centric and national media.

Philadelphia Cricket Festival and the DreamCricket organized Radiant Info T20 are examples of why positive news cycles are important for generating greater interest in domestic cricket. Not surprisingly, the finals of these events have drawn sizable crowds, and for many in the audience, it's their first live cricket match in the United States. In turn, the interest and the resulting eyeballs help drive more sponsors.

USYCA is the organization that clubs and leagues must emulate. The organization releases a steady flow of positive news via the internet and is also very active on social media. Little wonder then that it is the fastest growing cricket organization in the United States and the world has taken notice.

USA Cricket Western Conference 2010 Tournament Preview

openingbat — Wed, 15 Sep 2010 12:19:00 GMT

Now, you can get all the USA Cricket updates via Facebook. Also follow us on Twitter via @dreamcricket

By Peter Della Penna

The following is a preview for each of the squads headed to the USACA Western Conference Tournament that will take place from September 17-19 in Los Angeles, Calif.

Central East – The Cinderella champions from 2009 will need to make a similar miracle run to repeat as Western Conference champs in 2010. Gone are captain Usman Shuja and leading run-scorer Amit Kumar. However, last year’s leading wicket-taker in the tournament, Akhil Pathan, is back again to lead the bowling attack.

Wicketkeeper Ashhar Mehdi will carry a lot of responsibility with the bat while the team is once again looking to youth to make major contributions as Fahad Babar and Abhijit Joshi will also have key roles to play at the top of the batting order.

Central East squad – Shahid Malik (captain), Asif Mehmood (vice-captain), Raheel Akhtar, Fahad Babar, Mansab Butt, Pavan Chakravarthy, Maqsood Husain, Abhijit Joshi, Shehbaz Khan, Vamsi Kotha, Tanveer Malik, Ashhar Mehdi, Sameer Munot, Akhil Pathan, Aditya Sharma.

Central West – The team is loaded with talent and is almost certain to turn around last year’s fortunes after a disastrous 0-3 performance in Minneapolis, which included a controversial forfeit in their game against the champion Central East team. While Sushil Nadkarni will be unavailable due to work commitments, there are a few additions to make the team formidable.

Usman Shuja comes back to the Central West after spending a few years away with Central East and Atlantic. A new face will open the batting in Abbas Jafri. The teenager had the highest score at the U-19 Western Conference in Los Angeles last month, 139 vs. South West, and he’ll look to replicate that form playing on the same grounds against senior competition.

“I think he has a very bright future for the U.S.,” said captain Orlando Baker about Jafri. “He’s one that we’re going to have our eyes on. He’s a good kid, he’s willing to learn and he’s a hard worker so I’m just really looking forward to seeing him this week.”

Ryan Corns will look to play a bigger role this year after featuring in only one match in the same tournament last year. Rahul Kukreti is also back in the squad after the one-year suspension for his role in last year’s forfeited match was overturned by USACA, according to Central West manager Ahmed Jeddy.

Central West squad – Orlando Baker (captain), Majid Rizvi (vice-captain), Ryan Corns, Jignesh Desai, Charan Gowda, Vivek Inampudi, Abbas Jafri, Rahul Kukreti, Jermaine Lavine, Amir Nanji, Rohit Ramkumar, Usman Shuja, Supratim Srinivasan, Radhakrishna Yelamanchilli.

North West – Last year’s third place team has opted to go for experience over youth. Not a single one of the four players from the region who went to the U-19 World Cup in New Zealand were included in this year’s senior squad. Saqib Saleem was selected, but has since been replaced after he became unavailable due to school commitments.

One new face in the squad whose debut is eagerly anticipated is James Crosthwaite, the younger brother of former Victoria wicket-keeper Adam Crosthwaite. The bowling attack is the team’s biggest strength and is led by vice-captain Saurabh Verma and Bilal Khan, both of whom represented USA in 2010. They’ll get support from Samarth Shah and Imran Khan, who took incredible figures of 9 for 5 at the North West Region inter-league tournament earlier this year.

North West squad – Nauman Mustafa (captain), Saurabh Verma (vice-captain), Vijay Beniwal, Rishi Bharadwaj, James Crosthwaite, Shantanu Divekar, Ashwin Karuhatty, Bilal Khan, Imran Khan, Samarth Shah, Ashok Singh, Sunny Singh, Srikanth Sundaragopalan, Arjun Thyagarajan.

South West – The team that finished second in Minneapolis last year stands to be the tournament favorite this year on their home turf. Although the squad is loaded with experience, they also have an eye towards youth.

New to the squad this year are two former Ranji Trophy players from Gujarat, Amit Sood and Timil Patel. Salman Ahmad has also been picked for the South West senior squad for the first time. He recently scored a century in the U-19 Western Conference Tournament at Woodley.

Ahmad and Hammad Shahid will both look to gain more positive experience against senior members before making a push for a second consecutive U-19 World Cup appearance for USA. Meanwhile, several other players including Ravi Timbawala will be looking to reestablish their credentials in the minds of USA selectors in an attempt to join South West vice-captain Aditya Thyagarajan in the USA squad for ICC WCL Division 3 in Hong Kong.

“I think our squad is really balanced,” said Thyagarajan. “I think all four departments – fielding, batting, spin bowling, fast bowling – we have a lot of depth. We’re accustomed to playing at the Woodley fields and we’ll be definitely focused on coming back as champions.”

South West squad – Mehul Dave (captain), Aditya Thyagarajan (vice-captain), Salman Ahmad, Tarun Bhoomireddy, Elmore Hutchinson, Ritesh Kadu, Theo Mavrokefalos, Timil Patel, David Pieters, Abhemanyu Rajp, Ali Shafi, Hammad Shahid, Amit Sood, Ravi Timbawala.

Tournament Schedule

Friday, September 17 at 10 AM
Central East vs. Central West at Marder Field
North West vs. South West at Wong Field

Saturday, September 18 at 10 AM
Central East vs. North West at Marder Field
Central West vs. South West at Wong Field

Sunday, September 19 at 9 AM
Central East vs. South West at Marder Field
Central West vs. North West at Wong Field

Cricket documentary to be screened at All Sports Los Angeles Film Festival

openingbat — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 12:25:00 GMT

Now, you can get all the USA Cricket updates via Facebook. Also follow us on Twitter via @dreamcricket

By Peter Della Penna

While American sports fans often get to see their fair share of baseball, basketball and football themed movies, it’s not often that cricket hits the silver screen in this country. However, people in Southern California will get an opportunity this weekend when Rohit Kulkarni’s “Pitch of Dreams: Cricket in America” will be shown in the Pickford Theater at Raleigh Studios in Hollywood on Sunday July 11 at the All Sports Los Angeles Film Festival.

“It’s really funny that apart from the cricket playing community, a lot of people don’t know about the happenings of cricket and it would be a good opportunity for people in Los Angeles, especially sports lovers, to know more about the game of cricket, the history of this game and also the current situation of this game,” said Kulkarni, who filmed portions of the 40-minute documentary at Woodley Cricket Ground in the Los Angeles suburb of Van Nuys.

Kulkarni says that his film has appeared in three other festivals so far this year, including the East Carolina Film Festival in April. The students at ECU gave Kulkarni a very positive response and he hopes that plenty of students from USC and UCLA, as well as the rest of the local community, will have the same reaction if they come out to watch the film. “Pitch of Dreams: Cricket in America” is scheduled to be screened on Sunday at 12:25 pm along with three other short films packaged together to form Short Series G on the event schedule. Tickets are $10.

“The biggest selling point is obviously its association with mainstream America in the sense that the historical association that America has with cricket which is fairly unknown, even the baseball fanatics here don’t know that before baseball it was cricket and the guy who wrote the first rules of baseball was a cricket player,” said Kulkarni. “So there are certain interesting elements about the history.”

One of Kulkarni’s reasons for making the film was to help bridge the gap in terms of American sports fans’ knowledge about cricket by giving them something concrete to watch and absorb.

“They have heard it, but they haven’t really seen. The one thing that was consistent throughout a lot of people that I met, everyone mentioned that they don’t understand the game,” said Kulkarni. “They just know it’s closer to baseball and every time they’ve visited England or other countries they have seen it on TV. But no one I think ever attempted first to make this connection and show the excitement related to cricket and I think that’s one of the main factors of this documentary, to show America that this game is very exciting and a lot of people are playing it, whether it’s the immigrant population or whether it’s the first, second generation of American kids.”

A total of 67 films will be shown from July 10-11 at the All Sports Los Angeles Film Festival with a mixture of fiction and non-fiction entries, shorts and feature length movies. The sports that will be on view besides cricket include popular ones like baseball, basketball, football and soccer while other films delve into the worlds of rugby, boxing, cycling, surfing, judo, horse racing, marathon running, Aussie Rules football, kite running, lacrosse, badminton, roller derby, wrestling and hula hooping.

Kulkarni plans to enter his film into several more competitions this year, including the South Asian Film Festival in New York. DVD copies of the film are also available to purchase. For more information about “Pitch of Dreams: Cricket in America” write to citylightsfilms@gmail.com.

For more information about the All Sports Los Angeles Film Festival, visit www.allsportslafilmfest.com. You can also watch a trailer by clicking here.

Stamford gets an astro-turf wicket!

openingbat — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 19:24:00 GMT

The Stamford Advocate reported on June 27th that the city of Stamford installed a " new artificial turf field" in Lione Park.

"Two of Stamford's active cricket teams, Stamford Cricket Club and St. John's Cricket Club, along with sister leagues from Bridgeport, celebrated the wicket's ribbon cutting Saturday by engaging in a friendly match.

The renovations -- which also included parking lot reconstruction, fencing improvements and landscaping -- cost $1.7 million, City Engineer Lou Casolo said.

Players said the new surface will take getting used to. The rubber crumb field seems to make the ball slower and give it some bounce, players said. But the pace may quicken as teams "break in" the turf."

It would be cool to have some pictures of this new field. [For pictures of the old field, click on thumbnail below]

Cricket gets noticed by The American Conservative Magazine!

openingbat — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 19:07:00 GMT

The American Conservative magazine, the bastion of traditionalist and paleoconservative forces in America took note of the growth of cricket in USA!

"Is America slowly becoming a cricket-playing country? This interesting NYT video shows how immigrants from South East Asia have developed cricket leagues in New York. After the surprise success of Netherland, Joseph O’Neill’s award-winning novel about a cricketing subculture in New York, is a pattern emerging? The USA Cricket Association says that cricket is “the fastest growing sport in America.”

Some American conservatives might buckle at reports of this quintessentially limey sport being played on their soil by immigrants from the developing world. I mean, how UnAmerican can you get?"

Doubtless, among its readers, reactions ranged from welcoming to polarizing. Here's a sample:

"Cricket rocks and it has got nothing to do with the queen."

"People from the Indian sub-continent have arrived on our shores in great numbers within the past 20 years. I buy my newspapers and lotto tickets in a shop that has cricket on the TV throughout the day. This shop also sells bongs, crack pipes, ***, long-distance telephone cards and Slim Jims. The new America in a nutshell."

New York's Cameron Mirza debuts for Northamptonshire Under 17's

openingbat — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 02:21:00 GMT

New York's Cameron Mirza made his county debut for Northamptonshire Under 17's against a South African touring side at Oundle Cricket Club today. The 15 year-old batsman featured in 50 over Northamptonshire's Development Team match thanks to an arrangement made by MCI Head Coach, Ian Pont.

Pont, a consultant coach to the Northamptonshire professional and Academy teams, recommended that Mirza get a chance to play whilst he was in the UK, having worked with the player at DreamCricket Academy's summer camp last year. It's part of his ongoing development as a player through MCI and is a wonderful opportunity to experience county age group cricket.

''It was an amazing day'', said Mirza. ''I batted at number 5 and faced two really good spinners on a slow, low pitch that offered a huge amount of turn. The South African side made it hard to score with accurate bowling and tight field placing and it was a challenge to just survive for any length of time.''

With the temperature nudging 90 degrees, Northants made just 167 in its 50 overs, which was never going to be enough against a strong touring team that had previously racked up 350 in the last match. And whilst Mirza made just 9 runs before getting LBW on a ball that jagged back sharply, he played a few confident shots including a lovely timed square cut for 4 and generally looked very composed.

''I am used to the ball coming on to me as an opening bat so facing two quality spinners the whole time was a real test. But I loved every minute. And the other lads in the team were fantastic.''

The touring side knocked off the required target with almost 20 overs to spare and just 4 wickets down. Mirza also got a run out to get rid of the opening batsman.

Coach Ian Pont said, ''Cameron is a great player and has a lot of natural talent. Playing in English conditions is hard enough first time, but he only arrived the day before the match from the US and was thrown in the deep end. All in all I think he'll add this match into his memory bank and take the experience away as something very worthwhile. The Northants players and coaching staff were all impressed with his attitude and ability. I don't think this is the last time he'll get asked to play. The first-team pro coach, David Capel also turned up to watch.''

Mirza plays another match on Wednesday, this time guesting as an opening bat for the adult team, The South Oxfordshire Amateurs side against Tring Park CC in Buckinghamshire before flying back to NY on Thursday July 2nd.

''I can't wait'', said Mirza. ''Every match played here on grass is such a delight. It's a new challenge for sure, which I hope I can learn from quickly.''

Editor's Note : Ian Pont will be at DreamCricket New Jersey in July to conduct Summer Camps and workshops. For a schedule of his camps and to register, go to http://www.dreamcricket.com/dreamcricket/cricketcamps.hspl

New York's Aussie rules footy team looking to share ground with cricket

openingbat — Mon, 18 May 2009 16:30:00 GMT

New York's Aussie Rules Football team - New York Magpies are searching Manhattan and surrounds to develop a field with floodlights, spectator seating and a clubhouse.

Magpies coach Rob Oliver said the club, which has been operating since 1996, would invite cricket and rugby clubs to share and develop the space, which could be called Anzac Park.

Mischief Gal Rebecca Lee wants cricket in America

openingbat — Mon, 11 May 2009 13:51:00 GMT

After Lalit Modi and Inderjit Bindra, it is the turn of the Mischief Gals, the American cheerleading squad that is cheering for Bangalore, to push for cricket in America.

That's right. Mischief Gal Rebecca Lee wrote in her blog last week: "Heard somewhere that they are planning to launch Twenty20 cricket even in America. That would be cool. Over the last two weeks I have quite started to love the game. It is exciting and definitely can have a good following in the US."

This ringing endorsement from IPL's most visible American supporters came a week after Inderjit Bindra, ICC's Principal Advisor, suggested that USACA should copy the IPL model and look at private ownership for teams, each of which can have a mix of foreign and local players.

In fact, the gals have been so smitten by cricket that they watch it on the television even when they are not in the stadium. It is not just cricket, the gals have taken a liking to that other British export that is everybody's favorite in the commonwealth - Cadbury's!

"At home we don't have the same candy that they do here. It is odd to see so many different candy bars made by Cadbury, as we usually only see Cadbury candy at Easter time in the US."

You think of cheerleaders as airheads and other such unflattering cheerleading stereotypes, cease and desist immediately. Rebecca Lee went to Florida State University and Cumberland School of Law and is a practising attorney. She says, "Some people try to make us out as dumb girls, but cheerleading is on its way to become an Olympic sport, and so it's quite a serious sport."

Cricket, unfortunately, is not on its way to become an Olympic sport. So perhaps the cheerleaders will also push for recognition of cricket as an Olympic sport.

The American cheerleaders have figured out the ins and outs of cricket.

Rebecca says the rules are simple: "If the ball crosses the boundary along the ground, it's a four. If it crosses the ropes without touching the ground, it is a six."

Rebecca calls it baseball 2.0. Nothing more, nothing less!

Cardinal Gibbons School forms first school cricket team in Maryland

openingbat — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 02:28:00 GMT

Cardinal Gibbons, a private Catholic school in Baltimore, Maryland takes great pride in its heritage and is regarded as one of Baltimore's strongest centers of learning.

Originally named St. Mary's Industrial School for Orphans, its alumni includes the baseball great Babe Ruth. In fact, the legendary Babe Ruth once organized a fund-raising drive that netted well over $100,000 for the school, a massive amount of money at the time. Babe Ruth's old home houses the school's fine arts building.

A part of cricketing folklore is the meeting between Babe Ruth and Don Bradman at the Yankees stadium when the Aussies toured USA in 1932. "Us little fellows could hit them harder than the big ones," the baseball great famously said. And that was the school's only brush with cricket. Until recently, that is.

Students from Cardinal Gibbons have been working hard to grow local interest in cricket.

On February 28th, their efforts received a huge boost when they were visited by Gladstone Dainty, the president of the U.S.A. Cricket Association. Gladstone Dainty told players, their efforts will play a major role in moving cricket into the mainstream of American sports.

The Cardinal Gibbons cricket team was visited by Gladstone Dainty, President of USACA

"It underlines the significance of what we're doing," Gibbons coach Jamie Harrison said. "If cricket is ever to go from being a niche sport to being a mainstream sport, it has to crack into the American-born market."

Gibbons soon might get company with both Loyola and John Carroll in the process of beginning teams. Washington DC is also readying plans for a local youth cricket league. So the prospects look bright in the region.

Courtesy: Rich Sherr, Baltimore Sun
Picture Courtesy: Jamie Harrison

New York Times and IHT coverage of American College Cricket Championship

openingbat — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 13:30:00 GMT

Montgomery College of Maryland won the first American College Cricket Championship in Ft. Lauderdale this past weekend.

From The New York Times

As envisioned by Lloyd Jodah and Nino DiLoreto of the American College Cricket, this championship, to be held over spring break, will become the ultimate collegiate championship in USA. They toiled hard to make that a reality during the first year.

Not since 1881 has USA seen a collegiate cricket championship that has had such an impact. In 1881 U Penn, through the efforts of John B Thayer Jr. joined with Harvard, Haverford, Princeton, Trinity College of Hartford and Columbia to form the Intercollegiate Cricket Association. Cornell was admitted some years later. Columbia, Princeton and Trinity dropped out after the first season but the others continued to play well into the 1890s.

Yes, there are other college championships in America - such as the Intercollegiate Cricket League in the NJ/PA/NY area; MichCA IUST championship in Detroit (which was won by Oakland University), and the MidWest Cricket Tournament featuring some 15 university teams from the midwest (which was won by Columbus).

The American College Cricket Championship kicked things up a notch. Firstly, the championship is designed as a pan-USA championship and colleges from Florida to Pennsylvania entered the tournament. Secondly, they secured some top-notch endorsements and some small sponsorships. Shivnarine Chanderpaul gifted a trophy - a rare feat for USA cricket. The prizes were sponsored by Laparkan, DreamCricket's PavilionShop, and Bedessee Sporting Goods. DreamCricket.com provided media coverage. But the coup de grâce was that they got New York Times and International Herald Tribune to cover the final!

This year, five colleges took part in the event, traveling at their own expense. As New York Times noted - the students "packed their sunscreen and headed to Florida" to play cricket! By all accounts, the students enjoyed the tournament. In the words of Kalpesh Patel of University of Miami: "We always had the desire to play, but there was no real framework for us to get involved. "With that kind of a beginning, the organizers have set the stage for a bigger event next year.

This year, Sumantro Das of Boston University said that his team spent something like $400 per participant - a huge cost for a student. "Who else is doing anything for cricket in this country?" he asks. The Boston University Cricket Club received some help from the university. Lloyd Jodah, the tournament's organizer, hoped that the event would attract greater sponsorship support and the participating colleges would get more help from their universities. With luck, the tournament could be held at the 5000 seat Broward County Stadium that has a purpose-built wicket.

Cricket is not one of the eleven sports covered by HurricaneSports.com - University of Miami's athletic site. But when Miami students broke into "Go 'canes" chants, there was little doubt that they were as proud of their cricket as they were about their baseball.

Check out the following link for the article on New York Times article. Here is the link to the IHT article. Of course, here is the link to the DreamCricket.com article.

Montgomery College wins the Chanderpaul trophy

USA's Best Cricket Grounds - The Hobson Field

openingbat — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 16:02:00 GMT

Mark Hobson describes his cricket field as "a little bit of England" in Climax near Greensboro, North Carolina. He encourages the players to wear whites during matches and even during practice. He is a traditionalist at heart.

Hobson Field, Climax, NC - Aerial View. One man's passion!

The field is on seven acres of property and blessed with the right shape and the right topography for a cricket ground 160 yards long and 150 yards wide. The ground shares the space with a house and what was once a church, has a septic system, a scoreboard - shipped in from Australia - bathrooms (handicap accessible), fencing, bench seating and even some rocking chairs in front of the house that adds to the park cricket atmosphere.

The pitch is made of concrete with outdoor carpeting and three teams play their home matches at the field, which also has practice nets.

The ground features a pavilion and an amazing outfield.

The church house is used as a clubhouse and meeting room while the house reminds Hobson of the Ealing Cricket Club's pavilion in West London where he played cricket before he came to the United States 29 years ago for a two week vacation. He also played junior cricket with Middlesex.

Hobson, now 49, a senior executive with a mattress company and married with two children, remembers when he had $1,200 in his pocket, no job and nowhere to live. But this is a country where dreams can come true.

He now leads a comfortable life, still loves his cricket and still is the wicketkeeper for High Point Cricket Club in the 36-team Mid Atlantic Cricket Conference.

Hobson has a nice success story to tell and how he has helped cricket flourish in North Carolina. But he is reluctant to talk about how he has spent a considerable amount of his own money to buy the land and turn it into a cricket field so the game can grow even more.

The Hobson pitch is concrete with outdoor carpeting selected to get the right bounce.

Hobson recalls how he first moved around in Florida, Illinois and Minnesota and how he drove around North Carolina without finding a field for teams to play cricket.

After he bought the land he faced many obstacles before he eventually got the go ahead from local authorities. At first, it was tough, few people in the area had heard of cricket let alone watched it, and there was a mountain of red tape, hearings and letter writing to be completed before he was given the green light. It took him three years to make this dream come true. In the process, he created "a piece of the British Commonwealth in a rural stretch of the Triad," as one newspaper wrote.

Hobson even laughs about it now when he remembers how people thought he wanted to grow cricket bugs for fishing instead of having a cricket field.

Mark Hobson enjoying a match on his ground

Now he has professional landscapers help to keep the field in good shape, neat and tidy and a woman named Pam, who lives in the house on the property, helps with cutting the grass.

"I love cricket. This is the culmination of a dream," he told DreamCricket.com. "I want to give back to the cricket community. I am an immigrant who came here with nothing and got a chance to do something. I was fortunate enough to spend money on this. It is my legacy."

Asked if in the future his field would have a turf pitch, Hobson said: "The game is still recreational and there is too much maintenance."

Hobson describes the standard in his Mid Atlantic Cricket Conference as high. He said: "I am impressed with the players, the spirit and their attitude."

He says the league has about 500 active players with 65 percent from India, 20 percent Pakistan and the rest from cricket playing countries like Australia, West Indies and Britain.

Hobson is clearly attached to his field, the Cape Cod style home and the surroundings, he said: "I might retire in the house one day."

Mark Hobson - what a legacy to leave behind

Mark plays for High Point Cricket Club.