The sport of cricket is surging in the Yukon.
Gyanendra Singh, the president of the Yukon Cricket Association, said they have started a league this year. The schedule consists of monthly tournaments running until September. They held their first tournament of the season May 18-19 at Christ the King Elementary School.
Seventy-five players participated on five teams, with 15 players per team.
Singh said everyone was “super-excited” about the tournament.
“For me, it’s my first victory, so an amazing feeling. Everybody gave their best.”
Despite chilly, windy and occasionally wet weather, he said, “Everyone’s having fun. This is going amazing. Good sportsmanship. A lot is going on.”
The final featured the Strikers versus the Hawks. Each team had one inning of batting with 15 overs (six balls bowled, or pitched).
The Strikers opened with 122 runs.
The Hawks came up just short of matching the Strikers, scoring 117 runs.
The Yukon Star spoke with one of the champion Strikers’ stars, Purvil Patel, after the match.
“For me, it’s my first victory, so an amazing feeling. Everybody gave their best.”
Patel has played in all three cricket tournaments in Whitehorse recently.
He said the key to victory was “team effort.
“It’s a team sport. We wanted everybody to play together. That’s what we did.”
Strikers captain Raman Khumar said it was a great victory.
“It’s a fantastic feeling to have. In the first tournament, I was on the winning side but this time, I’m playing as a captain, so it’s even better.”
Khumar was named the Man of the Tournament and Best Bowler of the Tournament.
He humbly said, “I was just giving everything for my team. It’s a team game, so these individual things doesn’t really matter. The main thing is that we won the trophy.”
Khumar added, “Everybody was supporting each other. That was the main thing why we were on the winning side.”
The Strikers Rajan Bajwa was the Man of the Match in the final.
The Hawks’ Stephen Masih was named the Best Batsman of the Tournament.
The Best Fielder was Karan Bajwa of the Strikers.
The players also play informally at Christ the King Elementary and the ball diamonds off Robert Service Way. In the winter, they play in the fieldhouse at the Canada Games Centre.
Anyone is welcome to come and try out the sport.
There are also plans to get youth and female players involved by promoting the game at schools and colleges.
“That’s the whole purpose of forming the association,” related Singh. “In five years, you will be seeing a different picture.”
The Cricket Yukon website is cricketyukon.ca
They can be found on Facebook under Yukon Cricket and on Instagram under cricket_yukon
