Cricket in Chennai: The great and the not-so-great

Veteran journalist V Ramnarayan, the author of Mosquitos and Other Jolly Rovers: The Story of Tamil Nadu Cricket, on Chennai cricket down the years

India’s most high-profile league

Chennai cricket has a niche appeal unlike any other.

The city runs India`s most high-profile league that has over the years drawn a large number of professional cricketers from other parts of the country, even producing some high-quality cricket every now and then.

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It has some of the finest infrastructure in India outside Test match grounds, thanks to its unique brand of industry-institution cooperation in the cause of cricket. However, the appeal, unlike international cricket played in the city, does not extend to attracting spectator support, perhaps because its most loyal followers have lost hope in their boys delivering the goods.

Its most prominent feature is the tremendous if disproportionate corporate support the game has enjoyed here over the decades, going back to the 1930s when CP Johnstone of Burmah Shell ensured that the future double international M J Gopalan could pursue his twin loves, cricket and hockey, to his heart’s content.

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Gopalan’s livelihood was guaranteed so long as he strove on the field of play and wielded a dipstick diligently to measure the gasoline levels in the city’s petrol stations—a job requirement that did not unduly test his ability.

The MS&M Railway was another early employer of sportsmen in the city.

The Hindu was a prominent patron by the time the 1950s rolled around, with the introduction of the Sport & Pastime (later the Hindu) Trophy for firms and banks, arguably the first 30-30 event in the world (the Puja knockout in Tripunitura, near Kochi, probably a close second).

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Many other business houses supported sportsmen, cricketers in particular, starting with ‘European’ companies like Parry & Co., Stanvac, Philips and Gordon Woodroffe, followed by public sector giants like Southern Railway and Integral Coach Factory and banks like State Bank of India, Indian Overseas Bank and Indian Bank, to name a few of the many institutions responsible for the job security and welfare of cricketers in the city. India Cements, the Sanmar group, MRF and India Pistons have been among the other major champions of cricket and cricketers in Chennai.

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