It is not at all surprising per Priyadarsan and Mohanlal as they state their passion and love for Cricket. "During our school and college days, we had a cricket team, City Cricketers, for which I used to open the innings; Mohanlal was the all rounder and pinch hitter. Some of our team members played in the Ranji Trophy for Kerala, while others got into Malayalam film industry,” says Priyadarsan remembering his younger days.
Both of them are working towards owning an IPL team from Kerala, with the support of the Kerala Cricket Association (KCA is affiliated to BCCI) which is also looking to add more teams to the premier T-20 tournament.
“We’re trying to nurture local talent, as the most successful IPL players this year have been little known guys like Manish Pandey, Pragyan Ojha, and Kamran Khan. There are a lot of youngsters in the small towns of Kerala and Tamil Nadu waiting to get a break. They have the talent, but lack exposure and world class training facilities,” adds an optimistic Mohanlal.
Shashi Tharoor, the Thiruvananthapuram MP and the new Union Minister of State for External Affairs, has been roped in as the chairman of their team, to be called City Cricketers. On the other hand Robin Singh has been signed to be the technical director of the team.
Priyadarsan also states: “Thanks to Shah Rukh Khan, we were able to send five promising lads — Mohammed Niaz, Mohammed Sanuth, Rohan Prem, P Prashanth and teenage batting sensation Sanju V Samson — to attend the selection trials of the Kolkata Knight Riders. They might not have made it to the team, but they got to see how international players train and the exposure has helped them”.
Also the sources add that a couple of NRIs and a few corporates are willing to fund the project which will cost around Rs. 250 crore. The team will also have its own state-of-the-art cricket stadium near Kovalam.
“The KCA will approach the BCCI with our proposal, and if all goes well, we will start our
IPL innings next year,” concluded Priyadarsan.
