New Delhi: Coca-Cola India, the country’s leading beverage company, today announced the 2nd season of the Coca-Cola Cricket Cup Under-16 Cricket Tournament, a major initiative in promoting grassroots cricket in the country. Organized in partnership with Procam International, this year, the inter-school cricket tournament will be played in 67 districts across 10 states, under the aegis of the respective State Cricket Associations. The Coca-Cola Cup is the largest Inter-School Cricket championship in India. The 2nd season was announced by Ms. Sujatha V Kumar, Director- Marketing, Coca-Coca India along with Ajit R, Vice President, Procam International, Saba Karim, Chief Mentor & former international cricketer, Lalchand Rajput, former international cricketer and Dr. Samir Pathak, representing Hull Cricket Club.
Launching the 2nd season of the Coca-Cola U-16 Cricket Cup, Sujatha V Kumar, Director - Marketing, Coca-Cola India said, “It gives us all at Coca-Cola India, immense pleasure and a great sense of satisfaction that many talented young players have been identified at the grassroots level and will now be getting groomed to go on to play bigger league games in the future. On behalf of Coca-Cola India, I would like to congratulate all the three talented Coca-Cola Cricket Stars for an astounding display of talent and wish them the very best for the future. Coca-Cola India has always believed in promoting healthy, active lifestyle through sports. We believe that India has great sporting talent. Some of the best sportsmen have come from the most unassuming of places, and it is our endeavor to give this talent a platform with robust grassroots initiatives like the Coca-Cola U-16 Cricket Cup. We are excited about Season II and look forward to engaging more youngsters through this program.”
Launched in September, 2011, the Coca-Cola U-16 Cricket Cup tournament has emerged as one of India’s largest Inter-school Cricket tournaments. In season 1 the tournament spanned across 66 Districts in 10 states, involving participation from almost 11, 000 young cricketers from over 700 schools. The initiative was also supported by various State Cricket Associations, former Test players and eminent Cricket administrators.
The likes of Professor Ratnakar Shetty, Lalchand Rajput, Sunil Dev, Shivlal Yadav, I S Bindra, Jagmohan Dalmiya, Sanjay Jagdale, Arshad Ayub, V Raju, amongst many others lent their support. The program stretched over a duration of 8 months and over 1500 matches were played by talented young cricketers who also underwent a national training camp and got an opportunity to train with the IPL Teams; Kings XI Punjab and Mumbai Indians. The final Coca-Cola XI team also got the wonderful opportunity to play a 3 match series against the Sri Lankan National Under-16 Team. Finally, KDMA School (Kanpur, UP) beat Rizvi Springfield School (Mumbai) in the finals to emerge as the Champions of Season 1 of the Coca-Cola U-16 Cricket Cup.
Prof Ratnakar Shetty - “I believe Education and Sports should go together, initiatives like these are extremely important to promote the sport at the grass root level. We are extremely thankful to Coca-Cola and Procam for their support and I am sure these aspiring cricketers have learned a lot from their session and will continue to perform well here.”
Vivek B Singh, Jt. MD, Procam International, had this to say, “We are delighted to continue to have Coca-Cola India as our partners for the 2nd season of the Coca-Cola U-16 Cricket Cup. Coca-Cola’s support for sporting events is well documented, this partnership will enable us to encourage young cricketing talent in the country and serve as an ideal platform to promote grassroots cricket, identify promising talent and groom the country’s next generation of International cricketers. With India’s vast population and geographical spread, it is not easy for talented players to find the right platform and emerge into the spotlight. The Coca-Cola U-16 Cricket Cup aspires to be that platform for every deserving cricketer so that great talent never goes unrecognized”.
The occasion also served as a platform to introduce the three Coca-Cola Cricket Stars -- Sarafaraz Khan (Mumbai), Akshay Brahmbhatt (Baroda) and Nitin Tanwar (Delhi), the most talented of the players from the first season, who returned after spending around 25 days in UK on a training-cum-playing trip. This trip to UK was the first step in the mentoring and development of the three players as part of the commitment on behalf of Coca-Cola India and Procam International.
Charting the course for a bright cricketing future, the three Coca-Cola Cricket Stars have been signed up by Coca-Cola and Procam International, who will strive to make available to them the best facilities possible, to help them further their cricket careers. Their expenses arising purchase of kitting and equipment, besides training will be taken care of. Procam International will nurture these boys both on and off the field, hence enabling them to make the best use of their talent and opportunities and succeed in the sport of cricket. The three players were in the UK from June 22 to July 18, 2012, training and playing matches almost every alternate day. Sarfaraz Khan played for the Hull Cricket Club in the Yorkshire League, while Nitin Tanwar players for the senior team of Hymers College, Akshay Brahmbhatt turned out for the senior team of Cheadle Hulme School.
The Coca-Cola U-16 Cricket Cup is an Inter-school grass root level cricket initiative to discover budding cricketing talent in the country. The program is open to all young cricketers in the age group of 12-16 years. The tournament will be played across 10 states in close to 70 districts involving more than 11,000 young players from more than 780 schools. Chennai will be an additional center and the winner of Chennai and TNCA Districts will represent Tamil Nadu in the Inter-State Challenge.
Speaking about the initiative, Saba Karim, former Test cricketer and Chief Mentor of the initiative, said, “It has been a very healthy learning experience in the 1st season as we got to see some great talent at the under 16 level. Overall we have been happy with the results and look forward more competitive cricket in the 2nd season”
Winners of the Coca-Cola U-16 Cricket Cup will be awarded a cash prize of Rs.1 lakh, while the runners-up would get Rs 70,000/-. 20 talented players selected from the Coca-Cola Inter-State Challenge will get a chance to attend a week long ‘Coaching Clinic’ under the guidance of prominent former cricketers of the country. Post the week long coaching, the final Coca-Cola XI team will be selected and given an opportunity to prove their mettle by participating in a competitive tournament against an invited International U-16 team from other cricket playing nations
The winning schools at each stage of the Coca-Cola Cricket Cup stand to win significant prize money. The total purse for this tournament amounts to INR 10 lakh, besides awards and gifts as gratification. While all the teams reaching the pre-quarter-finals stage of the Intra-State championship will be presented with T-shirts and caps, the members of the teams that make the semi-finals will be presented with cricket kitbags. There will also be man of the match awards for each match from the pre-quarter-final stage onwards.
Indian Sports News Network