The Department of Physical Education of St Aloysius College, Mangaluru, in association with St Aloysius College Digital Media Cell conducted a ‘Crick – Chat’ with international cricketer David Johnson and soft launch of St Aloysius Cricket Academy  in association with Karavali Cricket Academy, Mangaluru on Tuesday, 1 February 2022. The programme was held in Sanidhya Hall of the College and the Soft Launch of the Academy held in Centenary Grounds. Rev. Fr. Melwin J Pinto, Rector of St Aloysius Institutions blessed the academy.

The interaction session ‘Crick-Chat’ with the former international cricketer David Johnson was held prior to the launch of the Soft Launch of St Aloysius Cricket Academy. He answered a few queries related to the cricket world by interviewer Manoj Fernandes, faculty of BBA department. During the talk, David Johnson recollected his journey as a cricketer and said, “I started with tennis ball cricket. Now there are a lot more facilities compared to the ’90s. I played against Australia where the test cap was given by Sachin Tendulkar. Playing for a country will always be a special feeling. Nowadays, it has become a batsmen’s game. In Indian pitches you don’t get many opportunities for the bowlers who need to work hard to pick wickets.”

He further said, “As a youngster, I was told to cut pace. They told me if I keep hurling the ball like this, I will not play more than one year but I went on to play ten years of domestic cricket and even represented India. It’s okay for a medium pacer to talk about line and length but if you have pace, you shouldn’t compromise.” To a question pertaining to youngsters hooked on to T20 games, Johnson said, “Due to too much cricket, players feel the mental stress and take long breaks from cricket. Starting T20 for U19 will affect their game, T20 is just fun, but the ultimate is test cricket where you need to be like Laxman or Dravid who play for five days while Sehwag too has done good in test cricket. However such players will not last long in test cricket”.

Principal of St Aloysius College Dr Praveen Martis, SJ said, “A new beginning has taken place at our institution with the starting of St Aloysius Cricket Academy with collaboration with Karavali Cricket academy. My request for the young budding cricketers is that they need to be passionate, disciplined and work hard to make it big, like our chief guest David Johnson, and also our alumni K L Rahul. You should not think of money when you show interest in Cricket, but have a passion and achieve a goal. Follow in the footsteps of David Johnson and K L Rahul who had studied at Jesuit institutions, and made big achievements”.

Rector Fr Melwin Pinto SJ also speaking said, “Good to know that a cricket academy is getting started at our institution. Don’t play cricket just for the fun of it, instead have a passion, work hard to reach your goal. Follow in the footsteps of David Johnson and K L Rahul, both alumni of Jesuit institutions, in Mangaluru and Bengaluru. We need to produce more K L Rahul’s and David Johnson’s here at the newly started St Aloysius Cricket Academy. You need to have discipline like Rahul right from the beginning. That quality must be developed.”

President of Karavali Cricket Academy Shanthi Mohan, Vice president Sabitha Misquith, Dayanand Bangera, J P Shetty, Arun Melcom D’Souza, Physical Director of St Aloysius College and others were present.

Ashwin of Karavali Cricket Academy proposed the vote of thanks.  Manoj Dyson Fernandes, Social Media Cell of the College, compered the programme.