Finally, after sixty-five articles with the Oman Observer through the months of late March, April and May, here comes a day when its time for us to bid adieu to all your wonderful people for all the love and support that you have showered upon us. And in return all that I have is loads and loads of gratitude towards each and every one of
you all.
What a wonderful season of the best franchise cricket in the world did we have. I assure you that, this has been the best of season of IPL and its not just me, but the stats also state the same.
Talking about stats, through the IPL, we have received over 15,000 correspondences from people of different walks of life and we would like to appreciate each and everyone of them. Our success rate on predictions was over
80%, which is a number that any predictor or pundit would be extremely proud about.
For the last decade, I have been managing cricket teams, through which I understand the perspectives and expectations of the team owners and the management personnels. I have been involved in the field of media for the last half a decade and that’s the area which I have enjoyed the most.
This space started with 500 words and after multiple increases had reached to a 1,000 words space and this is courtesy of all the love and engagement that we have received in the fan comments column. I wouldn’t lie, over 2 months of break-free engagement was extremely exhausting and half-way I was short of motivation, but
every time that I read the fan comments, which poured in large numbers every day, I would be more than excited to get back to writing every day.
TOUCHING LETTERS
I would also like to take a moment to thank all those people who kept on writing to us every day. I do understand that, we had a limitation on occasion we could on publish 1% of the comments which were coming in. To be honest, we just didn’t expect this kind of success and love from all you wonderful people and we were overwhelmed with the responses. I would certainly like to thank the entire team of Oman Observer for consistently backing and supporting me with all the sudden changes that we came up with your suggestions.
There were a few comments which touched my heart and surely got me very emotional. I am glad to be an inspiration behind the Omani youngsters that have followed this column and even started this wonderful game of cricket. I was extremely touched when this column was able to get an Omani youngster out of depression and start this wonderful game. I couldn’t have been more pumped than have inspired a mother to send both her daughters to an academy. One thing that I least expected was for a local to open a cricket academy during this span for the development and growth of local talents.
The instance of Dr Makarand and his son Arihan bonding through debate over their favourite cricket team almost every other evening did make me smile. I loved the involvement of youngsters and one such instance was that of Jeet Shah, the junior national cricket captain. But if I have to pick just two best comments, it has to be of an Omani housewife complaining of how watching cricket has suddenly become a part of their daily activity. Another one is on how the families unite together during the festive season of IPL.
There is a reason why Oman Observer is the national newspaper of Oman and it’s the most read and followed print media news platform. I would like to once again thank each and everyone involved in this crazy roller-coaster ride and I hope to connect with all of you as soon as possible. Oman is soon going to be travelling to Zimbabwe, for making its road to the world cup. Whether it can or not, only time will tell, but that’s surely an opportunity for us to connect.
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