Date:16/03/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/03/16/stories/2008031656481800.htm

Sport - Cricket

Chappell gets encouraging response

KOLKATA: Former India cricket coach Greg Chappell received an encouraging response when he made a trip to the city to oversee a talent hunt contest on Saturday.

Though there were a handful of demonstrators brandishing placards asking Chappell, whose differences with local icon Sourav Ganguly became public, to “go away”, that hardly had an effect on the participation. He kept himself away from the media.

There were a total of 487 participants in the Reebok Cricket Star Twenty20 contest, which is a part of the talent hunt organised in the eight IPL centres in the country. Chappell, who is the advisor of the Future Cricket Academy in Jaipur, was accompanied by its director and bio-mechanics expert Ian Fraser.

Chappell selected 22 players in the first round and further pruned to the number to three in the final round. Adil Imam (Kolkata), Suvaaankoor Das and Manas Muduli (both Orissa) were picked up from the city. — Principal Correspondent