Author: Boria Majumdar

Sport has a very unique way of making a point. Thursday was a prime example. Each one of us is guilty of hyping up the return of stars to domestic cricket. The assumption was that they’d come back, score tons of runs and make it back to the national team. Domestic cricket, we are all guilty of portraying, is a piece of cake. Bowlers are there for the slaughter and stars like Rohit Sharma, Shubman Gill and others would come and make merry. Tokenism – playing one domestic match is nothing more than that – was deemed the answer to…

Mid-March, 2020. It was time for the third and final ODI of the series between India and South Africa at the Eden Gardens. It was a curtain-raiser of sorts before the IPL took over. That was when Covid wreaked havoc in our lives. The world had not yet come to terms with the virus, and vaccines and therapeutics were a fair distance away. Closure or lockdowns were the only solution, and on the evening of March 11, it was made known that the game had been called off as a precautionary measure. The IPL too was postponed, and Kolkata was…

Most bilateral T20I series lack context. Unless it is a World Cup year, such series are just about adding to players’ statistics and the board’s coffers. Not so this one. And the reason is Mohammed Shami. As he returns to bowl for India at the Eden Gardens tonight, all eyes will be on him. Is he fit and ready to lead India’s attack yet again? Can he bowl with the same pace and venom? Are the skill sets the same after 15 months of sitting out? Is the hunger the same and can he reproduce the magic? While T20 cricket…

I host events for a living. But then, only very few leave a mark. Monday night at the Eden Gardens was one such. When you have Sourav Ganguly, Mithali Raj, Jhulan Goswami and Mohammed Shami on stage with you and more than 100 young cricketers, men and women, in front of you as audience, it is your responsibility to ensure that those youth find the programme meaningful. That’s what I tried to do, and in the process, learnt a lot. Sample this from Shami. When I asked him what kept him going these painful 15 months since the 2023 World…

At the Champions dinner last night, hosted for the winners of the Tata Mumbai marathon, we had a surprise guest. N Chandrasekaran, Chairman of the Tata Group and Tata Sons. Chandra Sir, as he is fondly known or called, has always been an active supporter of participative sport. In fact, at his behest, the Tata Group is currently the biggest supporter of distance running events across India. Mr. Chandrasekaran had missed the marathon in the morning and had another flight to catch late at night. And yet he decided to make it to the evening and catch up with Mo…

Boria Majumdar in Mumbai Hosting the Tata Mumbai Marathon for a fourth year, I have to say, is the most humbling experience. To see 62,000 runners on the streets of Mumbai early on Sunday morning, running for a cause, is one of the most unbelievable sights possible. My call time was 3am. But, to my surprise, half the city was awake. When I reached the stage next to the old Victoria Terminus, it was buzzing. The excitement was palpable. At 4:30am, the legendary Mo Farah joined me on stage. To think the man was child-trafficked at the age of 9…

Ajit Agarkar and Rohit Sharma will address the media later today after the Champions Trophy team is chosen. The point is whether they will take some real questions and give some honest answers? For example, what’s the diagnosis on Jasprit Bumrah? Even if there is no timeframe for his return yet, surely there is a road map that has been planned. It has now been two weeks since Bumrah last bowled in Australia, and no one really knows what’s going on with him. While he tweeted saying he isn’t under bed rest, isn’t it fair to all tell his fans…

We are in the process of finalising an Olympic bid. And it is something our Honourable Prime Minister is very upbeat about. Yet, when it comes to staging events, we still leave a lot to be desired. In the ongoing India Open badminton in New Delhi, multiple players have mentioned to my colleague Gargi Raut that the facilities are below par. Gargi reported that the washrooms were filthy and unusable. She even sent us photographs, and it was clear that these aren’t facilities that are remotely adequate for an international event. While the Badminton Authority of India (BAI) did get…

Much is being said about leaks at the moment. How is it that dressing-room and team-management issues are regularly finding their way to the media in Indian cricket? ‘Leak’ and ‘gossip’ are the two buzzwords at the moment. Frankly, every exclusive story is a leak. If there were no leaks, there would be no exclusives. The entire industry would then work on press releases. No journalist would ever break a story and it would all be boring. It is only natural that a journalist would seek an exclusive. It is part of his or her job. When I recruit someone…

There have been a lot of news items floating around on Indian cricket over the last few days. Mostly, these have been gossip. Some, however, are relevant and raise a few eyebrows. For example, we have all made stories out of senior players joining practice with their state teams and agreeing to play Ranji Trophy. Yet, it is only natural that they’d do so, isn’t it? The Ranji Trophy is India’s premier domestic competition and it is only natural that everyone would play if there is no schedule clash. In fact, if someone doesn’t, that is news and not the…