Cricket has been a passion of mine for a very long time. As far back as I can remember, I loved cricket. My first cricket bat was made out of an Asian palmyra palm tree leaf. A lot of people from south Asia may remember these trees or even the bats made out of the stems. The leaves are large and the stems are as sharp as a handsaw. I think I was just starting school at that time, it was in the mid-90s. The second bat I had was made of a wood plank, a major upgrade from the palm tree leaf bat that I had. It was flatter and didn’t bend backwards unlike my first bat. Although the handle wasn’t very comfortable, I was very pleased with the look. Ultimately, I was just excited to have something that resembled an actual cricket bat.
Here are some pictures of bats similar to what I started playing cricket with, the palm tree bat on the first photo and the wood plank bat on the second.
Photo Credit: Nikhil Patil Photo Credit: Alamy Stock Photo
I learned to love cricket found myself wanting to get better at it. When I was very young, I used to chuck the ball instead of bowling it. We were playing with tennis balls or tape-tennis balls, a normal tennis ball wrapped over and over with electrical tape to give it a smooth surface and some weight, as we called it back home. The impulse to chuck the ball at a young age rather than trying to bowl it was natural. So in the children’s matches that I would play in, I wasn’t given the ball. On top of that I wasn’t a very good batsman either. It was very upsetting. So, in order to get picked by the better teams and get more opportunities to bowl, I started using my left arm to bowl. It took a while but I was finally bowling spin in matches with my left arm while fielding and throwing with my right. It was bizarre. This lasted for about a year or two.
Then I wanted to bowl fast. No matter how hard I tried, I could not get the same power or accuracy with my left arm as my right. So I started practicing with my right arm again. I was bowling medium fast for years. Then my family immigrated to the US, the year was 2004. It was a difficult time for me, trying to get used to a new language, culture, norms, and sports. The first few months, I tried a few American sports that the neighborhood kids were playing with varying degrees of success and failure. It wasn’t until a year later that I was able to pick up a cricket bat again.
From the mid-90s to the mid 2000s, I went through a few tape-ball bats, perhaps 4 or 5. I wasn’t spoiled but I also didn’t . I could annoy my parents enough through nagging and throwing fits to get any sports equipment that the neighborhood kids had. I was never the first one to get something in the neighborhood but I certainly wasn’t the last.
Anyways, I some of my closest friends in middle and high school, from 2005-2008. In 2005, me and one of my friends started actively seeking out places where people were playing cricket. Soon enough we found other kids who were playing tape-ball cricket regularly at a nearby park in Jackson Heights. We started playing with them. Finally, we were in our element.
But the fun did not last. Cricket, like many other sports in crowded cities like New York, has its complications. Playing in a public park, we had to be extremely careful of not hurting other park-goers, many of whom were children. We had to be careful of where we hit the ball, if we should go for a catch while trying to avoid bumping into other people nearby. At the same time, we had to share the playing field with other people playing baseball, soccer, American football, Tennis and basketball, all within a public park that takes up roughly half a city block.
We soon grew tired of the limitations that this kind of cricket brought. We started looking elsewhere. Later that year, I believe it was 2006, we saw an article on a Bengali newspaper about a final match of a cricket tournament scheduled to be played at Kissena Park in Flushing, New York. We took the 7 train to Main Street, Flushing and then a bus to Kissena Park. The park is fairly large. We wondered around a while looking for the cricket field. We even asked a few people but no one seemed to know what we were talking about. After about an hour or so of walking around, we finally figured out that the park is larger than we thought and the playing fields were on the other side of the park from where were wandering about.
We crossed Kissena Blvd and walked over to the people wearing white cricket jerseys. There were a few people watching the game while others were in the field playing our favorite sport. It was an exciting moment. We kept our distance from the spectators as we were young and socially awkward teens, looking on and not knowing anyone . We were satisfied to witness knowing that playing cricket here was possible.
That same year, I bought my first cricket kit that included a BDM bat, some pads, a pair of batting gloves, a helmet and other necessary items; all overpriced and lacking in quality. But I didn’t know any better. I didn’t know where to buy cricket equipment. So I went the closest place that were selling sub-par stuff. But I was happy with what I had. We started playing at a nearby park. It was 2007 and me and my friend were attending different high schools. It was a time when most of us still had a home phone. I didn’t have a cell phone for myself until a couple of years later. That’s another story. But my friend and I were meeting up in the afternoons and weekends to play cricket. We found others who were doing the same.
Fortunately, my friend went to a high school where there were quite a few people who were interested in playing cricket. Some of whom became good friends with me over the years as well. We were looking around and finding different places and people to practice with. In 2007, we were spotted by a few players of a team and invited me to play the following week for their team. I played my first match of cricket the following week. It was more difficult than I had imagined. I opened the batting and batted 10 overs to make 3 runs. They allowed me to bowl as well and I bowled quite a few wide balls. It was not a very good debut.
I did not play any other matches that year but kept practicing. At around the same time, New York City Public School Athletic League (PSAL) picked up cricket as a public school sport for the first time in 2008. Needless to say, I joined my high school, Aviation High School, cricket team and played with them until I graduated high school.
With the help of a few veterans who wanted to start their own team, my friends and I signed up for the 2008 Bengali Cricket Association of North America (BCANA) tournament. We played decently that first season and built up some confidence. Due to some internal disagreements with the veterans, the team split up. By the following year, we had the experience and finances to start our own team, NY Vikings, in the league. The year was 2009.
That first year, we were the runners up for the championship of the lower division in BCANA. We never looked back. Although team members changed, we kept on playing for years.
Our photo with the runners-up trophies in 2009.
While I was playing in the school tournaments, I was spotted by another team in 2008, MMZ Cricket Club. For the next few years, I was playing a lot of cricket. I was playing for my high school team, for NY Vikings, and for MMZCC. I developed a new love for the sport over this time. It was something I truly enjoy to this day. Cricket became my getaway, my place to relax, where I felt most comfortable.