Cricket for Everyone-the motto of Kapole Sports Group
Back in 1996, with an intention of doing something good for the community, Kapole Sports Group organized its first ever cricket tournament. 18 years later, they have achieved a giant feat to become one of the top sports organizers. This success was the result of arduous work done by Mr. Hiren Seth and his colleagues. “Sports was far away from our community when we started the club. We wanted our people to indulge in sports activities. We mainly organize matches for our community and play with Gujarati samaj.Things have changed a lot over the years. We are happy that we could do something for our society,” said Mr.Seth. “We organize various
tournaments which are conducted for entire season of cricket. We have one tournament where each team represents one particular community. The unique thing about our organization is that we organize tournaments for everyone, that is, for every age group. Our main aim is to encourage people to come and play different sports” Mr.Seth talked about the main purpose for him to start this organization. “Back in those days there was only one prime tournament. That was the Times shield. So many teams used to participate in it. After a particular stage it was played on a knock out basis. Due to this it was as good as an end of the season for the teams who couldn’t qualify to knock outs. We noticed that on an average a player was playing only 5-6 matches after practicing for 6-8 months.
That’s why we decided to start a tournament. To become a good player, it is necessary to keep in touch with the game and to play in more number of matches. This is how it all began.” The journey which started with just a single tournament has now reached the apogee. Today Kapole sports group organize as many as 10 to 12 different tournaments every season for every possible age group. “To start with, we have under 10s tournament. Then there are under 12s, under 16s and open category tournaments. That’s not all. Usually we find that tournaments are organized for these particular age groups but we also have a tournament for the people who are in above 40 age group. We also organize soft ball cricket tournament for women. If these senior guys who are above 40 will play cricket then naturally the culture of sports will be emulated by their children. That’s what we want to achieve,” explained Mr.Seth. “We play various formats of cricket. T20, Multiday and the limited overs as well. We now have more than 400 players who are playing in these tournaments.
We travel outside Mumbai as well for playing cricket. Basically we play in the radius of 200 Kms which includes Vapi, Daman, Silvasa, Palghar, Pune, Lonavla and of course the suburbs of Mumbai. Due to the rule of MCA that one player cannot be a member of more than 2 clubs, lots of quality players were not getting a chance to showcase their talent. We are targeting these professional players and giving them a platform via these tournaments” The efforts of Kapole sports group have been fruitful. Lots of players who start their cricket training under Kapole sports group also play for Payyade sports club.
“When it comes to tournaments, we categorize teams in A , B and C groups according to their strength. This gives everyone an equal chance. Also the players keep changing the teams depending on the format of game. Some are T20 specialist or some prefer to play in Multiday matches. Couple of our players Umang Shah and Maulik Mehta are performing brilliantly in times shield b division. Both of them have played for MCA under-14s,” said Mr. Seth. Mr. Seth himself was a bowler and used to play cricket during his school and college days. He thinks that Tata Steel’s team is one of the top teams he has seen. Finally Mr.Seth talked about the prospects of Kapole sport group “Like cricket now we are organizing lots of tournaments of various other sports for our community. Our main aim is to work at grass root level and provide basic facilities to players. We want our player to go ahead and represent the country on international level. We will keep our good work going to ensure that culture of sports is pervasive in our society.”