My tryst with the RCB challenge
A brief tale of how I lost the contest but was won over by the RCB spirit.
The mind was in a tizzy since the day I received a call from the RCB team. The search for the best blogger was coming to a conclusion. I was to meet the jury comprising of Rajan Bala, RCB coach Ray Jennings and his highness Anil Kumble and prove that I was the right choice for the job baby ;)
With all the years spent in front of TV watching Cricket, arguing silly with friends, playing till I burnt myself black or frying the brains of my readers through my blog, I thought this impressing the jury business will be an easy picking, like the batsmen pick RP Singh for cleaners ;). To make things easy, Amrit from RCB called and said, “ Sir, we are delighted to invite you to Bangalore. We will arrange for everything. Trust us you will have a good time.” Need I say I had already taken the flight of fancy to the Chinnaswamy Stadium B’lore?
It didn’t take me too long to come out of my cosy, self glorified world to realise that it was a battle of equals and good was just not going to be good enough to win the race. The RCBs had very cleverly kept us busy earlier two days by throwing the Fan Club wide open for us to express our skills in front of our prospective base of 30,000 online fans. The hunt was on well before the big day.
Location: Press box, Chinnaswamy. Topic: Anil Kumble- the Captainship material never tapped. A topic as stimulating as it can get. A verbal GRE style test and a document to be edited (1700+ words of flab to be cut into Kareena sized post) rounded off the first assignment. A smile on the face as I walk down to have a bite. After polishing off Jalebis and ice cream with fellow contestants, I was getting my grey cells rearranged for the quiz to come by. I felt like Ricky Ponting facing Srinath bowling lovely short pitched stuff to be smacked out of the park.
Lovely short pitched stuff? Damn I say! All I got was bouncers, beamers and yorkers. (I still have my toe plastered! Ouch!!!) Who was the only batsman to play at 11 slots for team India? Who had the best strike rate in IPL 2008? Pick the odd one out of Balaji, Brett Lee, Amit Mishra, Makhaya Ntini and Yuvraj Singh? Manish Pandey was the only Indian to get a hundred in IPL 2009. How many runs did he score? So you get the point, right? You got to know your Cricket, err IPL, err anything under the sun mate!
As I was regaining my composure and pleading myself to put the best foot forward, it was time to face the music. The moment that had kept me awake, tossing and turning in bed for three nights straight was here. Jumbo and Jennings along with an ace Cricket writer to test the mettle. The first verbal volley was directed at me. So why do you think Anil Kumble makes a wonderful captain? Aha! Joy ahoy. Twinkle twinkle It is his ability to lead from the front that inspires the team. Next one was a floater that dipped and made me play a false stroke, well almost. (You see I am not the one to admit my mistakes easily ;) Heck! Do I make any in the first place? :)) After all that success, what inspires Anil Kumble to take the field? He took the horse (RCB team) to the pond but could not make it drink the water. So this time around he should lead, inspire and make sure that his team completes the task by winning the cup. You see we RCB fans are a demanding lot.
As the clock ticked up, at the stroke of 7, the results were out. Royal Phantom- Prashant was chosen as THE ONE to take a trip with the RCBs and lead the bloggers pack. Siva who rules the lenses got the ace photographer tag while Sid impressed one and all with his crazy mix to be chosen as the Chief Fan. I believe all the winners chosen deserved every bit of it. Credit must go to the entire RCB jury panel for the stringent measures they employed to judge.
A realisation was surging inside me. How far was I from Prashant? By the margin of his knowledge and ability to spread smiles. Ajay Raj, a Sardaar as jolly as it gets came around, put his arms around my shoulders and said, “Yaar humne khoya kya hai? Bas paaya hi payaa hai.”
He made sense you see. Being flown in and out by KF; meeting gem of a talent in photographers like Ajay, Chandru and Siva; getting Kartik’s insights on how one can make career as a blogger; getting overwhelmed with Disha’s understanding of the game; makings friend like Prashant the wiz and Aman-a patiala da puttar; talking Cricket, Cricket and more Cricket with other contestants; and the icing on the cake- meeting, sharing, and clicking a photograph with Anil Kumble, the legend. If that wasn’t enough, a white coockaboora personally signed by Anil was waiting for us stake claims on. Heartening was to realise that as a blogger, my skills were up to the mark. Not small a feat considering the best 9 from the country were slugging it out.
Contrary to what everybody believed, this contest is just a beginning. We will keep reaching out to our fans through regular updates on RCB Fans portal, meet-ups, and more dhamaal all through the year. Take my word for it, when RCBs claim that they are game for more, they mean it. My experience has only strengthened that belief. Come guys, experience the good times with us.
Go RCB!!!
PS:
1. Nidhi and Sandeep- Kudos!
2. Amrit, I love your energy and untiring efforts to make things comfortable for us.
3. Prashant, Siva & Sid- All the best! You are a part of the team RCB now and we are cheering for you.
Love, Peace & Energy,
YogaN
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