By Chelsea Mattioda, News Staff
When freshman business major Pranav Adnani came to Boston from India, he felt something was missing. There were no stumps, no bails, no wickets – cricket, extremely popular in his homeland, wasn’t registering in sports-obsessed Boston.
“When I came here, I was surprised to know that the university did not offer cricket,” Adnani said. “My friends Anirudh Mehta, Parth Turakhia and I decided to take charge and approached the director of club sports.”
They founded the Northeastern University Cricket Association (NUCA) in January, and the club now has 35 members.
Though cricket shares much with baseball – players bat to score runs and switch offensive and defensive sides each innings – it remains less popular in the US.
Mritunjay Rai, a statistician the Boston Cricket Club, said international students like Adnani and Rai, are responsible for the sport’s growth in Boston. The sport is popular in other countries around the globe, notably the United Kingdom, Australia, India, Pakistan, South Africa and other countries in the Caribbean, where he says the vast majority of the players here are from.
Like baseball in the US, cricket is a part of the culture in countries like India, Adnani explained.
“I have been playing cricket ever since the age of 5, and it has become a game that’s very close to my heart,” Adnani said. “Having been brought up in India, I’ve grown up idolizing cricket legends like Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid and Sourav Ganguly.”
The club’s late start meant its approval was delayed, so members missed their opportunity to reach out to people during Welcome Week. They are still hoping to expand throughout this semester and the next couple years, and welcome any undergraduate and graduate students to join. NUCA is still growing more rapidly than was expected, Adnani said.
“We’re quite overwhelmed with the kind of response that our organization has achieved so far,” Adnani said.
One of the biggest obstacles the cricketers face is finding facilities for their new club, Adnani said. The winter weather has kept them inside, so they have generally used the Cabot Cages for tryouts, meetings and regular practices.
Adnani said they are aiming to get more involved and hope to compete against clubs from other schools like Boston University Cricket Club, Harvard Cricket Club, Babson Cricket Club and Massachusetts Institute of Technology Cricket Club.
The Massachusetts State Cricket League, which is also associated with the USA Cricket Association, has also worked to promote the sport in the area and supports private cricket teams like the Boston Cricket Club (BCC). The BCC currently has three teams: The first two have the best players and only 16 members each while the third team is used for expansion and is where the newest players start off.
Like the Northeastern club, the BCC is mostly made up of foreign players who were brought up playing cricket at home, Rai said. Most of the players live in the greater Boston area, but some live in other states, like New Hampshire. Rai said their fan base is primarily the close friends and family of the team members.
“We would really love to see more people there at the games, and paying more attention to cricket,” Rai said. “Maybe we should get some cheerleaders like the basketball teams.”
While the BCC moves up to higher competition, NUCA plans to continue growing and establishing its presence on campus.
“We want to expand our reach to the cricket-crazy Huskies willing to be involved with NUCA and keep the spirit of the game alive within the people of our organization,” Adnani said.
