The Rise of Kerala Cricket: Journey from the Backwaters to the Ranji Trophy Final

The key for lesser teams lies in the shorter formats of the game, where upsets are more common and a single brilliant performance can turn the tide. Test cricket demands consistency and endurance, as every facet of your game is thoroughly examined over multiple days. Mastering all aspects of the game over an extended period is crucial for success in all formats.

Kerala, however, have beaten the odds to seal their first final in India’s blue riband tournament. They will face Vidarbha in Nagpur from Wednesday.

“I also underestimated. I thought Kerala will become champions in the white-ball format (first),” says Biju George, Sanju Samson’s childhood coach who has been coaching in Kerala since 1997. “I used to tell the association secretary that we will keep pushing the youngsters in red-ball cricket so they get the experience, (but) focus on white ball for results. Surprisingly, it is the red ball that has given us the results, hopefully the cup too,” says Biju, now head of the Kolkata Knight Riders talent scout system.

The journey of Kerala cricket from the backwaters to the Ranji final is a fascinating story. Their challenges were different. Unlike most parts of India, football, athletics, volleyball and basketball dominated the state’s sporting landscape.

Players making a mark

Now things are good in cricket too. Apart from the success in Ranji this season, they have players in IPL and WPL. But when Tinu Yohannan switched from athletics to cricket in the 1990s, the training facilities were not that good.

“Kerala is a sporting state. When it comes to other sports, there is lot of history, but in cricket, even though we had good players, the culture was always missing. A good cricketing system is one thing which would take Kerala cricket to the next level. With the right management and right players in the team the cricketing culture has set in; how to go about the game, not just one or two players but everyone coming together,” says the former India pacer, pointing out how earlier players like himself and S Sreesanth trained at Chennai’s MRF Pace Academy and only came to play matches for Kerala due to a lack of facilities.

“We lacked infrastructure and had only one ground where we could play international matches; not many coaches to help you to reach the next level,” says Yohannan, who coached Kerala for many seasons and coached Andhra this season.

The early hostility

Cricket was frowned upon by the sports fraternity because of various reasons, including its money power. It was in this scenario that senior Kerala Cricket Association office-bearer TC Mathew set up the foundation for the game to develop in the mid-2000s.

“The talent spotting should happen in the schools, but Kerala is famous for other sports so the physical education teachers were 90% against cricket. They would bring up players only from their discipline. They believed cricket was killing their sports due to money power or muscle power, always abusing cricket. That is why I started the programme called cricket@school. We started some 700 schools cricket teams in Kerala,” says Mathew, who served in KCA from 1997 to 2017, including as its secretary and president.

“In 2010, I coined a programme called Cash Kerala, Mission 2020, that is to become Ranji Trophy champions by 2020. It is a programme where in all the districts we have school academies, then plus-two academies, then college academies, then three zonal academies.”

Biju says Kerala had to reinvent cricket to gain the attention of the masses, making sure to convey that it is not an elitist game. “Places like Mumbai have got a history of cricket. Kerala sporting history has been dominated by other sports. There was a time when every kid playing for Kerala was given the entire kit, including a quality English willow bat, because they couldn’t afford that. Kerala CA took a lot of different steps,” he says.

In a state where it rains for many months, setting up of indoor facilities was important. “Because we have rains most of the year, except from February to mid-May, it is difficult for the players to train. So, we have set up indoor facilities and are coming up with more such facilities. Earlier, in multipurpose grounds if it rained the entire day was lost. Now, with good drainage systems in our grounds, we are able to dry up quickly and use it within a couple of hours,” says KCA secretary Vinod S Kumar.

Yohannan emphasises that a lot of work still needs to be done at the grassroots level. “A big wave is going around in Kerala cricket, especially (winning) without the big names. It is inculcating belief in the junior cricketers that these guys are beating the top teams in the country and so we can also do that. That will rub off on grassroot cricket and I am sure more talent is going to rise from this good run of results.”

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