Me Me Me....

Monday, April 11, 2005

A Non-playing Cricket Star

You might be tempted to think that I'm writing about "Dada" Ganguly...but NO...there's hardly anything to write about him than whether he prefers chips or sandwiches, sitting in the dressing room! This is about a guy who lives on cricket...quite literally! but doesn't even step a foot on the ground...well enough of plot-building....i'm no Dan Brown!....this is about Harsha Bhogle, the most celebrated commentator, TV anchor of our times...why the hell am I writing about him now? well...one fine day I switched on the TV to get glimpses of my favorite morning time TP...a program telecast on ETV marathi called "Sanwaad", a celebrity interview show, hosted by Raju Parulekar, a writer, journalist....my favorite interviewer, other than Harsha himself...will write about him sometime later...yaa...so Harsha Bhogale was on the show! As you must have guessed by now that it was a Marathi interview!!!...was a treat to watch him speak fluent Marathi, considering he's from Hyderabad...i found him very agressive during the i/w...not quite known for this...as he himself stated that on his own show he tries to be as modest as possible because he himself is just a mediator between the viewers and the stars themselves...hope certain individuals like Siddhu, Shastri are listening! anyway it was nice to hear about his journey as a commentator...among various Qs asked to him was "What is so diff about Indian cricket than the Aus?" he said..."people won't like this answer much but its the same as the diff between a Merc and an Ambassador car!" he put most of the blame on the "system", the admins, the poor state of domestic cricket...spoke quite strongly against the commercialization of cricket....another Q asked to him was about should cricket be restricted to just test matches...I discuss this a lot with some of my cricket buff friends...was glad to see that Harsha had the same opinion as mine....He supported existence of all forms of cricket...said 20-20 should be introduced in a big way! his logic behind this was let the viewers make their own choice!...in the end he was asked about the emotional struggle between he as a cricket lover and a commentator...he accepted honestly that it gets difficult sometimes to control when india is not doing well...but he's got used to it now...well many more things were discussed during the show...can go on writing...but must take a commercial break now and get back to work :)

3 Comments:

  • Yeah, I knew he was a Maharashtrian (as is Rahul Dravid). Surpising that never came up in our countless discussion on cricket!

    By Blogger Atul, at 12:50 AM  

  • Brilliant man and brilliant writer. One of the best commentators (rather THE best) India has ever produced. Do read his book Azhar. Although it will be out of context now, it is a beautifully written book

    By Blogger Gaurav, at 1:34 PM  

  • As far as I remember I haven't said anything like that..but since you have raised this issue, here are my thoughts.
    whats wrong with being proud of the fact that some star originated from the same soil as you...calling this sectarian attitude is a bit too harsh...if someone makes comparisons based on this then you have a point.

    By Blogger Sandeep Shelke, at 10:29 PM  

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