LIVE SCORE

By Tushar Jha

We are a country starved of athletes. Aren't we?(Cricketers are and will never be considered athletes) It hurts us to think that out of a populace of over a billion people we struggle to produce a handful of them . We long for a medal with all devoutness and hope forlornly for a youngster from India to bring a medal to our country. We revile the Indian Sports Ministry and the Government for not encouraging athletic talent in the country and also entreat them to stop sending the numerous 'officials' on a junket to the Olympic Games. We also scoff at the Corporate to stop asking Sachin to ride a motorbike and showing his Credit Card power on TV ( For which they obviously pay him no end) and use the amount to promote other sports .

Drifting away from the above mentioned facts ,I would like to share a few moments I spent confabulating with a few first class cricketers on the evening of August 17th when the news of Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore , a former Army Major , winning the first individual silver medal for India in the post-independence era came in .There was an immediate roar and we jumped with joy. It was feeling of satisfaction and there seemed to be an immediate prance in us while walking down the street.

They( cricketers) were of the view that though cricket was their life amazing sense of pride was always associated with the sui generis Olympic Medal which perhaps any cricketer could never feel. They concurred that the feeling of competing in the mother of all sporting events and winning a medal which for us in India has been ever elusive would be a great high . To my amazement they also sincerely hoped that the TVSs, VISAs, Reliances and Saharas took time of from shooting advertisements with their Heroes and spent money on the Rathores, Satyadevs and the Pillays for a change which would obviously spur a lot of those 10-13 year olds to maybe pick up the hockey stick or an Archery equipment than the ubiquitous cricket bat and ball. Rathore's riveting effort had obviously made the cricketers stand up and salute him.

The effort from this master in Strategic Studies from Jaipur University has definitely come as a great upshot for us Indians and we at Cricketfundas.com offer our hearty congratulations to him and wish him all the best in his future endeavors.