Australia’s 1999 World Cup-winning skipper and legendary batsman Steve Waugh had been in India before the Coronavirus pandemic wreaked havoc in the world. Waugh was on a mission to discover cricket in India with his camera for his photobook “Spirit of Cricket”.
He traveled across and length and breadth of the country in January-February this year to capture photos and videos of every conceivable place where cricket is played in the country. Yes, he has captured images of the game even in the living room of a palace with Samarjitsinh Gaekwad, the head of Baroda’s royal family.
He covered places like Mumbai, Bangalore, Delhi, Agra, Mathura, Baroda, Jodhpur, Amritsar, Dharamsala, and Kolkata, capturing the beauty of the game in maidans, women’s cricket and even specially-abled cricketers in their full flow.
He even got Sachin Tendulkar to pose with the then longest living Indian FC cricketer Vasant Raiji. He went to National Cricket Academy for the Blind in Delhi and played with the players there and then drove to Meerut to document the manufacturing of cricket gear.
Waugh had revealed to Mumbai Mirror,” I’ve just taken 20,000 photographs from my 17-day trip all over India. This book will showcase the spirit of cricket in India and explore why cricket is a religion to the people. I have also over 50 hours of video footage to be turned into a documentary-style program. I will be editing all the above work over the next few months with the aim to sell the book by August. I’m hoping corporates in India will buy this as a gift to give their clients.”
Yuvraj Singh shared the video of the trailer for Steve Waugh’s book on his Instagram to which Sachin Tendulkar also replied on Twitter.
Yuvraj posted, “The spirit & love for cricket in India beautifully put together by the great Steve Waugh & his team! A wonderful display of equality, love & passion for the game which unites the country!”
Sachin quoted the tweet and said,” Love the way you’ve captured the love for cricket in India, Steve. Glad I could be a small part of this journey. Can’t wait to get my hands on the book. Thanks for sharing this Yuvi.”
Yuvraj then replied, “My pleasure master! You have always been my love and inspiration of cricket”
Here is the video shared by Yuvraj Singh:
