Glad that the Sahara Group and the BCCI have reached a compromise that paved the way for the participation of Pune Warriors in this year’s IPL, the franchise team’s mentor Sourav Ganguly wants his teammates to take inspiration from Mumbai Indians’ performance in previous season’s Champions League Twenty20.
“Good thing … There are so many players. I always felt that it would be solved and its a good thing that it has been solved. Now we have to see what players we get and do the best,” Ganguly told reporters here.
The BCCI and the aggrieved Sahara Group had ob Thursday reached a compromise after a series of hectic negotiations over the past few days, paving the way for Pune Warriors’ participation in the fifth edition of the IPL.
Sahara, which had severed ties with the Board and withdrawn the Team India sponsorship on February 4, will return as sponsor following the truce.
Pune Warriors, who would be at a disadvantage having boycotted the recent IPL players auction, can take inspiration from the Mumbai Indians, who won the Champions League Twenty20 last year despite missing several top players, Ganguly said.
“It’s T20 … we saw Mumbai Indians winning Champions League without seven or eight of their best players. That’s a hope for us. We will give our best (shot),” the former India captain said.
“It’s a challenge to play with whatever side we have.
It’s not the Indian team that we can pick for every tour. Once you pick the IPL team, its for two years or three years and we have to do the best we can with them,” Ganguly added.
The 39-year-old left-handed batsman was of the opinion that the outfit would miss skipper Yuvraj Singh, undergoing chemotherapy treatment in the United States, but said his health was more important.
“We will miss Yuvraj Singh. He is a quality player in this format. But health is more important.”

Sourav going to bounce back in IPL

The BCCI-Sahara saga finally looks to come to some kind of conclusion, with BCCI President N. Srinivasan saying earlier in the day, that: “we do appreciate what Sahara have done. They might have felt aggrieved and did not get what they wanted from the IPL.”
Finally, Sahara Boss Subrata Roy, came out on a News Channel today and confirmed, whatever may happen Pune Warriors will surely play the IPL & he says Sourav Ganguly will take all the final calls about it. He said, by no means, Sahara wanted the players to miss out on cricket and hence PWI team will surly play the IPL and all decisions about it, will be taken by Sourav Ganguly himself.
Also, Sahara Boss confirmed, something Team SCGanguly had posted back in August 2011, that Sourav Ganguly will be the captain of the PWI team & all cricketing decisions of the team will be taken by him.
Subrata Roy said he didn’t want the people of Pune to miss out on the IPL. Hence, Pune Warriors India will surely play.
However, Subrata Roy said, he is interested in the IPL only because of the Players in the Team & the people of Pune but in all likelihood, Sahara will not remain the sponsors of the Indian Cricket Team any more.
The BCCI & PWI will have a small meeting very soon to discuss further, but its looks very unlikely that Sahara will remain the sponsors of the Indian Cricket Team. But the PWI IPL team will surely play in this season of the IPL.
So, cheers to all the fans of Sourav Ganguly, you will again see the Maharaja back in the IPL again and this time as a Captain, Leading the Pune Warriors Team.

DADA

Sourav Chandidas Ganguly made his entry into this world on July 08, 1973 in Calcutta, the ‘City of Joy’, now Kolkata. He was born into a sports loving family and was the second of two sons born to Chandidas and Nirupa Ganguly. He was born into immense wealth, unlike many Indian cricketers, with the exception of royalty. His parents gave him the nickname of ‘Maharaj’ meaning ‘Prince’. Perhaps, they knew that their son was born to lead.

Sourav’s father, Chandidas Ganguly runs a flourishing printing business, the 3rd largest in Asia, that has helped make the Gangulys among the 5 richest in Kolkata.  Even  today, Dada’s

father is one of the major barons in the printing business in Kolkata. His palatial, joint-family home which has nearly 30 members in the Kolkata suburb of Behala has more than 45 rooms. There is suggestion of affluence everything in the Ganaguly household, from the palatial 4-storey building itself to the beautifully decorated rooms. The annual turnover of Sourav’s family is nearly 80 crores, with just a profit of 40 crores!

As a child, Sourav was extremely mischievous, a typical Cancerian one could say.  His brother Snehashish (nicknamed Raj) was born five years before him and became an accomplished left handed batsman. Though Sourav is a natural right hander, he learned to bat with his left hand from his brother, Snehashish. Sourav does everything else, including writing and bowling with his right hand.  Convenience was one of the reasons for Sourav to become a left-handed batsman as he could then use his brother’s cricket gear.

For someone who is one of the best cricketers of contemporary times, it would come as a surprise to many of Sourav’s fans that cricket was not his first love. Like all people who dwell in the city of Kolkata, Sourav’s first sporting passion was football. But like most Indian kids, he had to make the difficult choice between academics and sport and his mother wasn’t very supportive of Sourav taking up cricket or any sport as a career. But Snehashish, who was an established cricketer for Bengal only strengthened his brother’s resolve to be a cricketer and he asked his father to get Sourav enrolled in a cricket coaching camp during Sourav’s class ten holidays.