City to boast of three turf wickets shortly

SJCE grounds

All the matches were played on matting wickets. But shortly the heritage city will boast of three turf wickets including the the picturesque Gangothri Glades in Manasagangothri campus which already has one.

The one that the current team of Karnataka State Cricket Association (KSCA) led by president Anil Kumble and secretary Javagal Srinath is really proud of is the new turf wicket coming up in the Sri Jayachamarajendra College of Engineering campus.

Tucked amidst lot of trees and looking like it is perched on a hilltop, the work on the ground is going on at a brisk pace.

KSCA grounds and pitches committee chairman Vijay Bharadwaj  who was in the city on Tuesday to watch the opening match of the Under-19 Vijay Merchant trophy cricket tournament told Deccan Herald that it was due to the initiative of Srinath and the keen interest shown by Suttur seer Sri Shivarathri Deshikendra swami who handed over the land to the KSCA to develop that the work was taken up in the sprawling JCE campus.

Nearly 100 people are working on the ground daily. Even though the work began later than expected, it is now going on and Bhardwaj hopes that it will be completed by the end of December and they can hold a top class match in January 2012.
KSCA initiative

“The KSCA has taken up work on 19 turf wickets in the State in the last three months and the one that has come up recently is at the BGS International School in Kumbalgod,” he said.

The work on the Rs 50 lakh turf wicket at JCE is 60 per cent complete. “Tenders have been called separately for each work and hence the laying of turf is taken up by one contractor, the pitch at the centre is being done by another one. We are going to call for tender shortly for the construction of the pavilion.

There are two practice pitches also getting ready,” said Bhardwaj.

The ground at JCE is 72 yards from the centre of the pitch which is as big as the one at the Chinnaswamy stadium in Bangalore. The groundsman who was laying the grass said that it was Bermuda grass transported from Bangalore.

The third turf wicket that the KSCA has in its position is the one that is being developed at the Bharatiya Note Mudran Limited ground.

“This pitch is also a very beautiful one and once it is fully match ready, lot of cricket will be played here also. In fact the teams who have come to play the under-19 Vinoo Mankad cricket tournament are using this as practice pitch,” said Bharadwaj.

The Gangothri Glades cricket ground will also get a makeover with underground sprinklers going to be installed once the pitch at the JCE campus gets ready, he said.

KSCA Mysore Zone convenor S Vijayprakash said that the work on the ground at JCE campus should have begun in June this year itself after an MoU was signed between KSCA and the JSS institutions. However, the contractor who was entrusted with the work did not start it on time. Otherwise the matches could have been played by December itself.

However, he was all praise for the director of Bharatiya Note Mudran S Madhav Rao