A chance to get up close

No Contest

This is what excited the eleven winners who got to play a limited over match with the team of Royal Challengers Bangalore in the City, at the stadium recently. It wasn’t meant to be a serious game and boys were seen laughing and teasing each other on the field.

The winners who called themselves Winners XI put up a pretty impressive fight against the RCB.

The teams had their respective team captains. Aditya for Winners XI and Saurabh Sunil Tiwary for RCB. Biggies like Daniel Vettori, Virat Kohli, Chris Gayle and Zaheer Khan were missing. That was a bit of a disappointment for the winners who were more than looking forward to meeting them. So, it was the younger breed of RCB players versus the winners who were given a chance to test their cricketing skills against the veterans.

Excitement writ large on their faces, the winners said that they now understood that cricket is after all not such an easy game. “We saw how hard the cricketers workout and their commitment and dedication to the game is undivided. When you watch it on TV, it’s so easy but it’s only when we played with them that we realised that we were no match to them,” said Ravi Goyal with ABB from Faridabad.

This was also Ravi’s first travel to Bangalore and he said he was excited to be in the City he always wanted to visit. Rukesh from Mumbai said he was thrilled when he heard that he had won the contest. “A chance to just meet the cricketers up close and shake hands, take pictures and take an autograph was more than enough. This has come as a big surprise for me,” he said.

There were six boys from Bangalore and all of them said that this opportunity was a dream come true for them. Aditya, the captain of Winners XI, played really well. He consistently hit sixes and fours and was declared the man of the match. “It was a struggle playing against seasoned cricketers. I couldn’t help admiring the power with which the RCB players bat. It’s not easy at all,” he said.

There’s a thing or two to learn from the cricketers, thinks Abhilash, another cricketer.

“The commitment, dedication and the discipline these young men have toward the game is impressive,” he said.