Tigers unveil jersey
dubai — Anis Sajan, co-owner of Bengal Tigers, believes that their team is ahead in planning for the new format of cricket – T10 – and their captain has passion to keep the team in front in the race for the inaugural title that would be decided on December 17 after a four-day event.
“I wanted a captain, who is hungry, that’s why I picked Sarfraz (Ahmed) and he knows how to lift the team,” said Anis on the sidelines of a function to unveil the team jersey and anthem where Suhail Abdul Latif Galadari was the guest of honour.
Talking about the jersey colours, he said: “I have selected yellow and blue for two reasons. Blue for India and yellow, because Australia is always my favorite team.”
He reckons that planning for the T10 format was very important. “We have stayed ahead, we were first in picking our captain and coach and now we are the first to unveil the team jersey and anthem,” says the Danube Managing Director, who answers to the sobriquet ‘Mr. Cricket’.
Anis has played a lot of indoor cricket and his team has never lost indoor cricket tournament and he thinks there’s a lot of similarity between indoor cricket and the new T10 format.
“When you play indoor cricket you play more with the mind instead of playing slam bang, T10 cricket is also about using your mind and taking the right decision,” he said, adding that it is going to be very strategic.
According to the Bengal Tigers strategy, the team think-tank seem to have picked a strong bowling attack. “The game would be about containing, so we have packed our team with specialist bowlers. The Sharjah stadium is a shorter ground so there would be plenty of sixes and fours so a bowler that can restrict in these conditions would be an asset,” he reasoned the team strategy.
The team captain Sarfraz Ahmed, who was present at the jersey unveiling function, said: “I am pleased to be part of this new cricket league and loved the colour of the jersey which represents passion, pride and glory. The material used for the Jersey is lighter and it will help us keep dry on the pitch during action.”
On the players’ draft on Sunday, he said: “We would have loved to have Imad Wasim in the team but missed him as some other team picked him before our turn.”
“T10 will usher a new era of super-fast and super exciting version of cricket which will click with young generation,” said Bengal Tigers co-owner Neelesh Bhanagar, who owns NB Ventures.
sunilvaidya@khaleejtimes.com