Lumen Summer 2016 - Flipbook - Page 24
story by Ian Williams
Injury fails to slow Suhail
Professional cricketer, Kollywood movie star and now one of India’s leading
sports presenters and commentators – Suhail Chandhok has packed a fair
bit in since graduating from the University of Adelaide seven years ago.
A
nd it was his time spent in
Adelaide that Suhail credits with
giving him the confidence and
life skills to follow his dreams.
“When you arrive in a completely new
environment, where you know nobody
and you’re completely on your own, you
find ways to discover yourself,” he told
Lumen from his new home of Mumbai.
“The University and Australia gave me
that confidence and within three months of
arriving I felt I had something special that
could have a major impact on my life.”
Although not on his original list of
preferred options, Suhail came to Adelaide
because it offered him the opportunity to
study while following his passion for cricket.
He enrolled in commerce, studying
a double major in marketing and
management, and signed up to the
Adelaide University Cricket Club (AUCC) –
and he made an impact in both.
Suhail came away with an award for the
best marketing project in 2008 and also a
prestigious Half Blue Award for Sporting
Excellence after scoring back-to-back
22 Lumen | Summer 2016
100s for the AUCC versus Melbourne
and Sydney universities.
His skills with both bat and ball – he’s
a left-handed batsman and right-handed
off-spinner – also saw him promoted
to South Australian A-Grade cricket
where he found himself playing against
Test players such as Shaun Tait, Jason
Gillespie and Darren Lehmann.
Suhail worked for two years as a senior
coach at the South Australian Cricket
Association aiding the development of
young cricketing talent. He was also
appointed head coach of the Sturt District
Cricket Club women’s side with players
going on to win the ICC Cricket World
Cup in Australian colours in 2013.
“It was my dream to play at the
Adelaide Oval so it was pretty special to
have my name on the scoreboard where
I knew the likes of Don Bradman also
had his name. To play a day-night game
there was amazing and to score back-to
back centuries for AUCC is something
I’ll never forget.”
Back in India Suhail used his skills and
experience from university to establish
his own sports PR and marketing firm,
Adrenna Communications, and took his
cricket to an even higher level.
Cricketing scouts had spotted his
talent and he was soon drafted by the
Indian Premier League’s Bangalore Royal
Challengers to join their camp for the
Champions League T20 in 2009.
But Suhail’s promising cricketing career
fell apart. Consecutive knee injuries
put him in hospital and after multiple
operations he resigned himself to never
playing professional cricket again.
“I’ve always been an eternal optimist
but after being hit by injury so soon after
joining the Bangalore squad and after
so much hard work, I was devastated,”
says Suhail.
“I’d always wanted to play professional
sport and when it was taken away from
me so very quickly, it took a long time to
sink in. I couldn’t bear to watch cricket
for eight months seeing all my mates
playing when I couldn’t.”
