By Brendan Shaughnessy
Deejay Kumar first played cricket as a Grade 8 student in India. There, he notes, “it’s like a religion.” Like many people from his homeland, Kumar is a wealth of cricket knowledge.
In his five years of playing the sport in Ottawa, Kumar has developed a keen appreciation for cricket’s longtime connection to Canada.
“Most people don’t know – once, cricket was the national sport,” he shares.
Indeed, John A. Macdonald designated it as such in 1867. Five years later, the Rideau Hall Cricket Pavilion was built.
“The top players – like, gods of cricket – they played on this very pitch,” Kumar says while standing on the porch of the Pavilion and looking out over the field. “So, it is a privilege for us to play on the same cricket ground.”
There is now a new, younger generation playing on the grounds. Three years ago, the Ottawa Valley Cricket Council revived its junior program.
“When we started, we were struggling to get 11 players (for the age 10-19 team),” recounts Kumar, who works with the OVCC as well as the Ontario Cricket Association as a sport development director. “But now we’re getting more response from the community.”
Fees of $100 for a five-month season with equipment provided has proven popular, indicates OVCC junior program coordinator Darlene Batstone, but a major challenge remains that “people don’t know we’re here,” adds the mother of two boys who got hooked on the sport while living in the Caribbean.
A new cricket field at Millennium Park is a sign of the sport’s growth locally, but with its flat bats and funny pads, cricket is still a confusing novelty for many in the city – despite the fact that the Ottawa Cricket Club was established 18 years before Confederation.
In an effort to gain both exposure for the sport and experience for themselves, the OVCC juniors got to play their biggest game yet on June 25 at Rideau Hall – an exhibition against the Toronto Mayor’s team, composed of the top youth cricket players from the GTA warming up for a two-week cricket and leadership tour to Sri Lanka.
The more experienced Toronto team did as expected and soundly beat the OVCC juniors, but that’s not how we’re evaluating today,” Ottawa coach Heinrich Hattingh signals. “Today was about showing the boys what they can achieve if they work hard.”