Author: Boria Majumdar

Why do we organise the Trailblazers conclave? Is it just to celebrate the medal winners who have made India proud? Or is it to celebrate sport and not just the medals? For us, every athlete who did not win in Paris 2024 is also a winner and champion of the future. We are as much keen to know about their mental health and support them. Document their stories, and celebrate them in the very same way that we do a Neeraj Chopra or a PR Sreejesh. To quote Abhinav Bindra, who is a regular at the conclave, “The most important…

RevSportz Trailblazers Conclave 2.0 had just ended on March 8, 2024 and each of us had started to celebrate. For five months, we had worked to get India’s best Olympic and Paralympic athletes under one roof to make for meaningful dialogue that could enrich the sports ecosystem. The ambition was to make a difference in an Olympic and Paralympic year. With 30 of our best athletes a part of the conclave for two days, Mission Impossible had just been accomplished. That was when Shriyanka Sadangi walked up to me to say goodbye. Shriyanka is one of our best shooters at…

By Boria Majumdar In a remarkable show of resilience and skill, the Indian women’s hockey team stunned defending champions and World No. 1 Netherlands, clinching a dramatic 2-1 shootout victory after a pulsating 2-2 draw in the FIH Hockey Pro League at the Kalinga Stadium in Bhubaneswar on Tuesday. This win, led by the brilliance of Savita Punia, Deepika, and Baljeet Kaur, is one of the most significant in India’s hockey history, symbolising the team’s unrelenting spirit despite the heartbreak of missing out on the Paris Olympics. For Savita, this match held special significance. In January 2024, after India’s crushing…

Indian football has been all doom and gloom for a while now. The national team hasn’t looked great, and the World Cup dream remains a distant one. Failure to make the third round of the FIFA World Cup qualifiers still rankles, and there is no immediate solution in sight either. That’s where Mohun Bagan Super Giant (MBSG) are like a breath of fresh air. The management is committed and professional, financial support isn’t an issue, the fan base is ever-growing and the quality of players is at a very decent level and can get better from here. That’s what brings…

How bad are Pakistan? Who is responsible for this effort, or rather the lack of it? Will heads roll, and who will stand up and apologise to the fans? Hosting a global tournament after 29 years, Pakistan are all but out with a match to go. When they step out on home soil against Bangladesh, they would be fighting hard to stave off a whitewash in the Champions Trophy. Let’s speak about the Pakistan batting to start with. In the first 27 overs, there were more than 100 dot balls. This was cricket from the 1990s. The world has moved…

All eyes will be on the Dubai International Stadium from midday on Sunday. India versus Pakistan is always a special clash, and it is expected that the stadium will be full and make for a real spectacle. Tickets are hard to get, and online quotas were exhausted in no time. Fans have trooped in from all parts of the world and a huge number have made it to Dubai to watch just this one clash. However, while all of this is great for the build-up, what we also need is some real competition. Pakistan cricket – both the men’s and…

The stage is set at the Dubai International Stadium as India prepares to take on arch-rivals Pakistan tomorrow in the ongoing ICC Champions Trophy. The Men in Blue started their campaign with a win over Bangladesh, while Pakistan suffered a defeat against New Zealand. For Mohammad Rizwan and his team, this is a must-win clash to keep their tournament hopes alive. Ahead of this highly anticipated encounter, former Pakistan skipper Shoaib Malik had a candid chat with RevSportz’s Editor-in-Chief, Boria Majumdar. Malik shared his thoughts on Pakistan’s chances, the struggles of Babar Azam and Virat Kohli, and much more. Q:…

It was October 27, 2018, a date I remember as the Deodhar Trophy final was being played between India B and India C at the Feroz Shah Kotla (now Arun Jaitley Stadium). For the uninitiated, the Deodhar Trophy has been India’s zonal one-day tournament for years, but of late, has lost both relevance and context. But that year, it was being played in the Challenger Trophy format. Ajinkya Rahane and Shreyas Iyer were two of the biggest attractions during that final and scored big hundreds. Frankly, we remember little about the match, but an incident that happened afterwards has stayed…

“I want to perform for the team in all formats,” Mohammed Shami had said in one of our conversations last October at the Cricket Association of Bengal (CAB). “I am not bothered about the colour of the ball. Any time the selectors, coaching staff, captain show faith by giving the ball to me, all I want to do is to fulfill my responsibility as a bowler. I don’t think too much about records and all, or which format I am playing. If you are playing for India, you have to give your best. That’s it.” What he also said was…

It was the night before the start of the 2011 World Cup in Dhaka. I remember leaving the stadium around 1:30 am expecting the ride to the hotel to be smooth and swift. Normally, it takes 2-3 hours from Dhaka to Mirpur, with the world’s worst traffic greeting you every step of the way. To my surprise, there were 6000-8000 people outside the stadium at that hour shouting slogans and enjoying themselves. Most did not have tickets to the game the next day but were just there. Bangladesh had beaten India in the 2007 World Cup, and local fans were…