Author: Rahul Giri

-Atreyo Mukhopadhyay ATK Mohun Bagan vs Bengaluru FC. Unlikely opponents in this season’s ISL final? Yes, perhaps. Unlikely contenders for India’s most prestigious football crown? No way. Two of the country’s most illustrious and dedicated football units are up against each other in the pinnacle match to be played in Fatorda, Goa, today. The format, without promotion or relegation, is an oft-heard criticism of this ambitious project called ISL which started in 2014. A version of the IPL in football, teams owned by film stars and celebrities from other walks of life, a tournament featuring franchises sans the traditional entities…

  He has been a lightning rod for criticism of the Indian team in recent times, and has lost his Test place, but KL Rahul showed in a low-scoring game just how important he could be to India’s hopes of winning the World Cup on home soil. It’s fair to say that KL Rahul has stayed in Indian cricket’s short-term plans because of his ODI form on Indian pitches. A lot of players suffered form slumps in the aftermath of the Covid-19 pandemic, unable to get to grips with bubble life, quarantine periods and isolation from friends and family.…





The focus may finally be back on the 50-over format, but the numbers suggest that the “middle child” is increasingly an afterthought for both India and modern-day cricket.   How desperate is India to win the World Cup on home soil later this year? This June, it will be a decade since MS Dhoni lifted the Champions Trophy at Edgbaston, the last ICC trophy that India won. You have to go back another two years for the last World Cup win. But whereas the buildup to that 2011 World Cup bordered on the obsessive, it’s hard to detect similar fervour…

-Bharath Ramaraj If we take a piece of paper and do some number-crunching on Mohammed Siraj’s bowling, one particular statistic glows brightly: His first PowerPlay numbers in ODI cricket since the start of 2022. In that period, Siraj has plucked as many as 25 wickets in the first 10 overs. To understand Siraj’s ever-rising stocks with the new ball in the 50-over format, let’s turn the pages back in time to January 15 this year. The temperature at Thiruvananthapuram had cooled down a bit after soaring to almost 40 degrees in the afternoon. But while zooming on the action in…

-Anindya Dutta A flick off the legs. A single. A simultaneous expulsion of a billion breaths longing for release. A raised bat. A kissed wedding ring hanging from a chain around his neck. A look up at the sky. A silent prayer. It had been three years and a lifetime in the making, but the moment had finally arrived. Virat Kohli was once again a Test centurion. It didn’t matter that it was his twenty-eighth century. Nor, with this, his seventy-fifth overall in international cricket, he now stood alone at the top of the list of active…

-Boria Majumdar Indian badminton takes serious strides. Each time they lost a close match I’d call up Gopi and ask him why is it that Gayatri and Treesa can’t close out close games. Why is it that Gayatri isn’t being able to defend and why is Treesa rushing into closing points? Each time Gopi would tell me give them a little time. They have the ability. Gayatri will build more power and get better at defending and Treesa will get better at attacking. My question was when? Women’s doubles since Ashwini and Jwala hasn’t really been our forte and…

-Rohan Chowdhury The Hero ISL 2022-23 Grand Finale will kick off in a day, as ATK Mohun Bagan will lock horns with Bengaluru FC. After two breath-taking tie-beakers in the semis, both these sides sealed their final berths. The Green and Maroon brigade, however, the oldest in the country, 9-years old Bengaluru FC, might perhaps be the most successful Indian club in recent times, with two I-League titles, one ISL title, three Federation Cup titles and one Durand Cup title. This will be The Mariner’s first-ever ISL final since they joined the league in the 2020-21 season, but they have…