Father-son West Indian pair of Shivnarine and Tagenarine delighted to play together at venue named after India’s batting legend
Tagenarine Chanderpaul (left) with his father Shivnarine in Louisville, Kentucky last week
The father and son pair of Tagenarine and Shivnarine Chanderpaul were seen batting on the Sunil M Gavaskar Cricket Field in Louisville, Kentucky as the Louisville T20 tournament closed out on Friday and Saturday. Guyanese Shivnarine still plays club cricket a good six years after he last played for the West Indies for whom he scored 11,867 runs in 164 Tests.
ADVERTISEMENT
Father and son represented Louisville Cricket Club in the semi-finals and final. Louisville CC beat CICC by five runs in the semi-finals, a game in which Shivnarine scored 57 not out (39 balls, 3x4, 1x6). Shivnarine and Tagenarine put on 16 runs for the third wicket. A more prosperous alliance was witnessed in the final against Cincy TOPazc (although their side ended up losing) - 59 runs for the second wicket. Tagenarine’s 68 went in vain.
Is there pressure to bat with your dad at the other end, I asked Tagenarine. “A bit, to be honest, but there are advantages as he offers advice to help counter certain situations,” he says, while Shivnarine, 47, feels “extremely excited” to play with his son at the other end, adding, “because while I am there, I can see areas of his game that I can help him with.”
Have they developed a good understanding while batting together? “Definitely, because we had played lots of cricket for our village together club and country,” says Shivnarine. Tagenarine, 25, has to cope with the pressure of being a son of a famous father and puts that in perspective: “I am proud of my father and his achievements, this [pressure] serves as inspiration to do well. However, I can only strive to be a better version of myself everyday,” he says.
Incidentally, Tagenarine has played the role of West Indies’ middle-order batsman Larry Gomes in the yet-to-be-released movie, 83 on India’s first World Cup cricket triumph. The 1983 World Cupper, Balvinder Singh Sandhu, who was with Tagenarine at the film’s shooting near Birmingham, says, “Tag is a good player, a gritty batsman and also a fine young man.”
While the Chanderpauls were delighted to play at the Sunil M Gavaskar Field, for erstwhile Mumbai resident Jai Bokey, one of the pillars of cricket in Louisville, it is an honour to host two 10,000-plus Test run-getters at the Field - Gavaskar himself and Shivnarine. He now hopes to get Sachin Tendulkar and Rahul Dravid. In Bokey’s words, “In a 10,000-plus run-getters list of 13, we’ve already got two,” Bokey says with a chuckle.
Subscribe today by clicking the link and stay updated with the latest news!" Click here!
