Gurpreet makes Indian football history, plays in Europa League

July 1, 2016

New Delhi, Jul 1: Gurpreet Singh Sandhu's ground-breaking journey through uncharted territory reached the most important milestone as he became the first Indian footballer to play for the first team in the top-flight Europa League.

Gurpreet

Standing at a towering 6 feet and four inches, the Indian national team goalkeeper started for Norwegian Tippeligaen club Stabaek FC in an Europa League qualifier against Welsh side Connah's Quay Nomads FC in an away match in Rhyl, Wales yesterday evening.

The Europa League is a rung below the UEFA Champions League.

His night was, however, cut short by a hand injury that prompted a change after 28 minutes of play and brought into action Sayouba Mande, the team's first choice custodian till this match. "I am proud but also disappointed that it had to end due to an injury. But then again they are part and parcel of the game and we can't do anything about them," the 24-year-old Gurpreet told PTI before leaving for Norway.

The Indian, who has already started his recovery session in the gymnasium, is all but ruled out of the second leg.

He added: "I will have an x-ray taken in some time and we will see. But I am more or less ruled out of the second leg game. I am still looking forward to the future matches and there will be few play-offs."

While he has slowly walked his way into the starting XI at the expense of the more experienced custodian from Ivory Coast, Sandhu has been the number one goalkeeper in the Indian team since Stephen Constantine took over in 2015, with the English coach preferring him over veteran Subrata Paul.

Sandhu, who signed for Stabaek in 2014, made headlines in May when he became the first Indian to start in the first team in a top-division league of Europe. In that match against IK Start in the Norwegian Tippeligaen, he kept a clean sheet in a 5-0 away victory.

Gurpreet is now the only Indian to play for the first team in a top-division league of Europe. Mohammed Salim, former captain Bhaichung Bhutia and current national skipper Sunil Chhetri have all played abroad, but they were never able to break into the first team.

Bengal footballer Salim played for Scottish top-tier side Celtic FC in 1936, but he did not feature in the premier division.

Bhutia played for English third division side Bury FC in 1999-2000 and current national skipper Chhetri played for the 'B' team of Sporting Lisbon in 2012. Sandhu, who is from Mohali in Punjab, has gone one step ahead.

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Agencies
March 6,2020

Mumbai, Mar 6: Former India batsman Virender Sehwag expressed excitement over the upcoming Road Safety World Series and said he is looking forward to playing with Sachin Tendulkar again.

"I am very excited about this tournament because I will get another chance to play with Sachin. We have played many international matches together and there was a gap and then we played an All-Star match and now again getting a chance. I am looking forward to playing with Tendulkar," Sehwag told media persons.

In the opening match of the Road Safety World Series, India Legends will play against West Indies Legends on March 7. The main aim of the Series is to create awareness about road safety and change people's mindset towards their behaviour on the roads.

Sehwag hailed the initiative of Road Safety World Series and said: "I think it is a very good initiative by the government that they are working towards creating awareness regarding road safety. Awareness regarding road safety is important for everyone."

Road Safety World Series, a five-nation T20 cricket tournament, will showcase some of the biggest names in cricket from India, Australia, Sri Lanka, West Indies, and South Africa.

Players who will feature in this series include Tendulkar, Sehwag, Brian Lara, Yuvraj Singh, Zaheer Khan, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Brett Lee, Brad Hodge, Jonty Rhodes, Muttiah Muralitharan, Tillakaratne Dilshan, Ajantha Mendis and many more. Former India captain Sunil Gavaskar is the Commissioner of the Series.

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Agencies
February 4,2020

Potchefstroom, Feb 4: Yashasvi Jaiswal and Divyaansh Saxena guided India to a comfortable ten wickets win over Pakistan in the ICC U19 World Cup semifinal at Senwes Park on Tuesday and progressed to the final of the tournament.

Chasing 173, Indian openers Jaiswal and Saxena played cautiously and stitched an unbeaten partnership of 176 runs.

The duo built the highest opening partnership of the tournament's history. Jaiswal, the left-handed batsman, scored his maiden century of the tournament as he amassed unbeaten 105 runs studded with eight fours and four sixes.

Saxena scored 59* off 99 balls including six fours. India chased down the total in 35.2 overs. This is the first time in the history of the U19 World Cup that a team won a knockout match by ten wickets.

Earlier, Pakistan won the toss and elected to bat.

Opener Haider Ali and skipper Rohail Nazir's half-centuries guided the side to a respectable total of 172. Ali played a knock of 56 runs while Nazir accumulated 62 runs including six boundaries.

Pakistan did not have a good start as they lost Mohammad Hurair (4) in the second over. Fahad Munir, came to bat at number three, failed to score a single run and was departed by Ravi Bishnoi on a duck in ninth over.

Apart from Ali and Nazir, Mohammad Haris was the only batsman to score runs in double digits. He played an innings of 21 runs off 15 balls. Indian bowlers showed a spirited performance as they bowled out arch-rival in 43.1 overs.

Pacers Karthik Tyagi and Sushant Mishra bagged two and three wickets respectively. Spinner Ravi Bishnoi clinched two scalps and conceded 46 runs in his ten overs.

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News Network
July 3,2020

Karachi, Jul 3: Pakistan limited overs captain Babar Azam is tired of his constant comparisons with India skipper Virat Kohli and says he would rather be compared to the greats at home.

Babar, six years younger to Kohli, has a long way to go in getting close to Kohli's staggering numbers across formats. The India skipper has 70 hundreds to his name and averages more than 50 in all three formats.

"I would be more happy if you compare to me say a Javed Miandad, Muhammad Yousuf or Younis Khan. Why compare me to Kohli or any Indian player?" asked the 25-year-old, who is in England with the national team, said in an online media interaction on Thursday.

Babar has scored 16 international hundreds and averages more than 50 in ODIs and T20s. In 26 Tests, he has scored 1850 runs at 45.12.

He also said that he is not targeting any English bowler for the series next month.

"I don’t see who the bowler is or his reputation. I just try to play each ball on merit. England no doubt has a top bowling attack and they have advantage of playing at home but this is a challenge I want to score runs in," he said.

Before the squad’s departure for England, Pakistan batting coach Younis Khan said that pacer Joffra Archer will be a handful for the Pakistani batsmen.

Babar said that he would try to play every English bowler on merit but conceded that after getting runs in Australia last year, he was keen to leave his footprint in the coming Test and T20 series in England.

Reminded that some former Test players had already written off Pakistan for the England series, Babar said they were entitled to their opinion.

"But we don’t have a bad team and already we have been enjoying our training. It is good to be back on the field after such a long lay-off. I think we have the bowlers to trouble them like Abbas, Naseem, Shaheen and others while we have some experience in our batting line-up."

Babar said he would love to get a triple century in a Test match.

"When you score a century, you naturally want to go on and convert that into a double or a triple century. This is something I would like to do during the Test series.

"I like to play my natural game but my selection of shots depends on the conditions and bowlers."

Babar also ruled out any problems in the Pakistan dressing room due to the presence of former skipper Sarfaraz Ahmed, who was sacked last year.

But he said that since Muhammad Rizwan had been playing in all formats for Pakistan in recent times, he would be the starting keeper in the Test series ahead of Sarfaraz.

"I think we first have to give Rizwan a proper chance and Sarfaraz is there as back up."

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