Off the field

Kiwi sympathisers, tooKrishnamachari Srikkanth, who found himself displaced as junior coach by his former India colleague Roger Binny and...

Kiwi sympathisers, too

Krishnamachari Srikkanth, who found himself displaced as junior coach by his former India colleague Roger Binny and saw his former skipper Kapil Dev take over as senior coach, an assignment the dashing opening batsman thought he would get, has several sympathisers not only among Indian cricket supporters but also in the present New Zealand team.

The former Kiwi skipper Jeff Crowe, who is here with the present New Zealand team in India as manager, is one of Srikkanth-sympathisers. Crowe, before talking to mediapersons, seeks their business card to ensure that the persons he is talking to are genuine. At Jodhpur, during the tourist8217; three-day game against Board President8217;s XI, Crowe while looking at the visiting card of an agency reporter a namesake of the former India opener commented: 8220;Poor fellow, the other chap!8221;

A Dutch treat ahead

Someone else who is looking to greener pastures not of the US kind, but in Europe to make a living and for experience is Tamil Nadu youngster Rishi Sridhar. Rishi hopes to follow in the footsteps of Davis Cupper and India No. 3 Prahlad Srinath, who has been playing for clubs in Holland for a while now. Rishi, who played extensively this summer in Amsterdam, Maastricht, Utrecht and Rotterdam among other places, hopes to play for Ede, the club Srinath played for.

Rishi says he has yet to approach club coach Hans to see if there is a vacancy, though he wants to play in the first level, quot;where the big names like John van Lottum play.quot; He explained that in the Netherlands, where professional tennis is played the year round, there are two types of events. One is between clubs, in the summer, followed by individual tournaments round the year at four levels, A 1 to A 4 star, with the A4 being the highest.

Rishi ruefuelly admits that he was unable to play the A4 as he did not have the requisite number of ATP points, but he played a couple of A3 and A2 events. If he does get to play there professionally, it will be good for him, but if this sets off a trend, then Indian tennis will be worse off. Who can blame the youngsters anyway, given the quot;nothing ever happensquot; milieu here.

Honeymoon and play better

Indian Oil Corporation8217;s IOC8217;s Vasudeva Reddy was a happy man, at least till Mustafa Ghouse beat him in the semifinals of the DSCL Open, the national hardcourt tennis event in Delhi. Vasu, despite his loss, is looking leaner and fitter than before and seems mentally in better frame than what he was last year.

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That time, he lost to Rajasthan8217;s Jagdish Tanwar very early in the tournament. Perhaps Vasu8217;s new look has a lot to do with bride Sudha. Vasu married Sudha an NIIT professor in Hyderabad in April this year, following which the two zoomed off to the US for a prolonged honeymoon and also that Vasu could train and play a few tourneys there.

Vasu says he had a nice time, understated as is his wont and others say he came back specially to play the Nationals. Lots of the kids around the DTA complex are great friends with him and he makes a genuine effort with them. The other big names on the circuit would do well to take a leaf out of Vasu8217;s book.