Shoes or canvas, pink isn’t for me
I am a conservative dresser. On most days you’d see me in black, grey, brown or white T-shirts to go with the ever dependable denims. I don’t experiment too much with perfumes and have a few light ones. In shoes, there are usual browns and blacks. I may turn out in a neon mix training shoes for a gym session and that by the way is stretching things too far.
On a cricket field, I am almost shy to deviate from the hardworking whites, blues or greys. But the last two days have belonged to my colleagues in pink shoes. It all started with Sunil Narine, who bagged four Kings XI wickets in our win on Saturday. In his case, I don’t think it was a sponsor obligation as pink is his favourite colour. While batting, all our heroes wore the spectacular pink shoes. Andre Russell, Yusuf Pathan and, of course, our final-lap hero Piyush Chawla all prefer ‘pinkies’.
The pink shoes continued to hog the limelight on Sunday too. First to don them was the twinkle-toed batting superman AB de Villiers, who scored a brilliant hundred against Mumbai Indians. In the second game, it was Brendon McCullum, who imposed himself against Rajasthan Royals. Did you notice the colour of his shoes? Yes, the bright ‘pinkies’. I don’t know but somehow feel the ‘pinkies’ look better with RCB’s red than KKR’s purple or CSK’s yellow.
While the KKR quartet of Sunil, Russell, Piyush and Pathan maybe flash on fashion quotient, none of the KKR boys feature either on top batters or bowlers’ list of this season. But this doesn’t bother me one bit. If anything, it underlines my belief that cricket is a team game. You don’t need a bunch of geniuses who set the stands on fire, but 11 hardworking men who play for each other and the team’s cause.
“If you play for the name in front of the T-shirt, people will remember the name on the back.” I picked up this saying from one of the football teams and maintain that this is the essence of my sport as well. Trust me, everyone in the KKR setup plays with this belief. Perhaps, this is the reason why we have won two titles in the last three years and by God’s grace are in the top two this year.
While we spent a lazy day in the confines of the hotel, none of us can afford to be complacent. I am not thinking cricket at the moment although I am a compulsive sport watcher. I am desperately trying to switch off from the game. One of the things I tried doing was try my hand at some amateur painting. Yes, you heard it right. One of the painters who conducts a workshop at our team hotel coxed me into it. My first painting was a complete disaster as I tried to draw a picture of my wife and daughter. No, I am neither tweeting it nor presenting it to wifey – the very thought is scary.
Like I said, I am not born for colour. Shoes or canvas, pink is not meant for me. Although I am still jogging my mind to work out the best team jersey colour to go with the pink shoes, my conclusion is that black will be the best.