<<< Upclose with Rahul Dravid >>>

[Ram]

lolz.. I aint no reporter... I was just there along with other reporters.. So I pretended to be a reporter myself and had the guts to even ask a question... :--D If I were a reporter, I would have flooded ICF with so many photos with cricketers.. isnt it

No pass nothing.. You just have to pretend as if you are someone important and walk as fast as possible (or better still run, when you cross any security trying to stop you). I actually dont have any shame when it comes to gate crashing into players' area, pavilion etc especially when I can get a glimpse of my favorite cricketers. :--D,

lolz, you got guts dude.. Gotto appreciate your keenness to meet some of our legends in person..! :hatsoff: This is the part that confuses me no end.. If Rahul Dravid is playing a test match for India, he has multiple levels of security around him.. He cannot go out of the hotel without informing the local police and getting prior information. Heck, during the England series in late 2008, the Indian team even had presidential level security around them, with the entire route from the hotel to the stadium cordoned off. And look whats happening now.. Anyone can just walk up to the same set of cricketers (no offence to you Dina..:D), just because they're playing a Ranji match? The policies of our security agencies is baffling.

[StriKe]

thanx dinakkar for sharing :hatsoff:

[The Dark Horse]

:omg:awesome!!

[Zelig]

That's cool dina anna:hatsoff:

[Dravid]

nice stuff and lucky :two_thumbs_up:

[Dinx - the Jinx]

Dina - nice stuff Just as an aside how tall are you? Or was the photo taken weirdly. Dravid is not very tall and he seems to be towering over you?

lolz... its simple logic.. Dravid looks tall, cuz I'm very short.. :--D

[Temujin Khaghan]

dinakkar, i guess you wouldnt have had any jitters asking him for a picture. he must have been very polite.

[Dinx - the Jinx]

lolz, you got guts dude.. Gotto appreciate your keenness to meet some of our legends in person..! :hatsoff: This is the part that confuses me no end.. If Rahul Dravid is playing a test match for India, he has multiple levels of security around him.. He cannot go out of the hotel without informing the local police and getting prior information. Heck, during the England series in late 2008, the Indian team even had presidential level security around them, with the entire route from the hotel to the stadium cordoned off. And look whats happening now.. Anyone can just walk up to the same set of cricketers (no offence to you Dina..:D), just because they're playing a Ranji match? The policies of our security agencies is baffling.

You are both right and wrong.. During a ranji match, it is true that one can get close to international cricketers with not too much of an effort.. the security cover is very less compared to what it is during an international match... but at the same time, its not a cake walk to get to them either.. there are a few hurdles on the way (security guards, ground staff etc) and if you are keen and want to pursue your goal, you can achieve it with some smart thinking and shameless guts (i mean, you'll have to endure being turned back by some of the chamcha sort of guys who try to act smart.. and thats when you should not lose heart and stay put till your objective is achieved). Come to think of it, yes, the security is not good enough to protect a guy like Dravid, if anyone was looking to act funny... But same is the case when Team India is travelling abroad.. especially in countries like New Zealand. Its easier to get access to these players when they are abroad and even they are more obliging.. one of my friends who lives in NZ has taken pictures with the entire indan team. not just 1 picture, there are about 15 pics, each with 2 or 3 different set of players... The cricketers are more relaxed when it comes to being with fans when in a foreign country.. Security is also less... so you cannot entirely blame the Indian set up. You cant expect them to provide a tight security for a Ranji match where not more than 1000 spectators are expected. There indeed is some amount of security cover provided by a small team of police and the security guards employed by KSCA. But yeah.. if some terrorist decided to make use of this opportunity to do some harm, chances are that he could have managed to do what he wanted to... In that sense you can classify me as a smart ass who has the knack of knowing when to go where to get a chance to have a closer look at my fav cricket heroes.. among top cricketers I have met Sunny, Srikanth, Azhar, Shastri, Sourav, Sachin, Kumble, Srinath, Prasad, Joshi (he was once playing a club match in our college grounds) before this. In fact I had met Dravid in 1996/97 during the Tamil Nadu Vs Karnataka Ranji final at Chennai. But those were times when digital cameras were not around to take a pic and make it memorable (and ofcourse brag about it on internet). If you re really serious about this whole business of watching live cricket, meeting cricketers, you should be ready to invest a good amount of time as well. To start with I had to take time off from office to drive to the stadium (45 mins), wait for the match to finish (1 hour) and then when most of the crowd walked away, quietly slip into the area where there is a chance of getting closer to RD and if I was lucky click a pic (another 1 hour), without even knowing for sure that whether I’ll be able to make it or not.. for all you know, the entire effort would have been wasted had Dravid decided not to come out for the press meet. Last year the day before the Ind / Aus test series started, I went to the stadium in the evening to catch some players as I was confident that they will be practicing in the evening.. My bad luck, both teams completed the practice by noon and decided to go back and rest at the hotel.. I waited for an hour in vain and had to settle with pictures of the Wall that was erected in Chinnaswami stadium in respect of Rahul Dravid.

[Dinx - the Jinx]

dinakkar' date=' i guess you wouldnt have had any jitters asking him for a picture. he must have been very polite.[/quote'] well you cant quite assume that based on their image.. ppl who appear to be very polite in front of camera have come across as arrogant while in front of fans.. and vice versa... Azhar used to shoo away autograph seekers like they are dogs.. even children.. ts very difficult to catch sachin's attention for an autograph or picture.. sourave, for all his arrogance is very sweet when it comes to handling fans.. before going out to the nets, he'll tell the autograph seekers that he'll finish with the nets and then oblige them (he will show that his hands are inside gloves and hence cannot sign)... i dont want o generalize here. may be during my encounters they have behaved like this and may or may not behave the same way in other instances. after all they are also normal humans like all of us and would have their own mood swings as well...

[The Outsider]

Good one, dina....thanks for sharing!

[Brainfade]

well you cant quite assume that based on their image.. ppl who appear to be very polite in front of camera have come across as arrogant while in front of fans.. and vice versa... Azhar used to shoo away autograph seekers like they are dogs.. even children.. ts very difficult to catch sachin's attention for an autograph or picture.. sourave' date=' for all his arrogance is very sweet when it comes to handling fans.. before going out to the nets, he'll tell the autograph seekers that he'll finish with the nets and then oblige them (he will show that his hands are inside gloves and hence cannot sign)... i dont want o generalize here. may be during my encounters they have behaved like this and may or may not behave the same way in other instances. after all they are also normal humans like all of us and would have their own mood swings as well...[/quote'] Very interesting insight. Thanks for the OP and your other posts in this thread.

[Ram]

You are both right and wrong.. During a ranji match, it is true that one can get close to international cricketers with not too much of an effort.. the security cover is very less compared to what it is during an international match... but at the same time, its not a cake walk to get to them either.. there are a few hurdles on the way (security guards, ground staff etc) and if you are keen and want to pursue your goal, you can achieve it with some smart thinking and shameless guts (i mean, you'll have to endure being turned back by some of the chamcha sort of guys who try to act smart.. and thats when you should not lose heart and stay put till your objective is achieved). Come to think of it, yes, the security is not good enough to protect a guy like Dravid, if anyone was looking to act funny... But same is the case when Team India is travelling abroad.. especially in countries like New Zealand. Its easier to get access to these players when they are abroad and even they are more obliging.. one of my friends who lives in NZ has taken pictures with the entire indan team. not just 1 picture, there are about 15 pics, each with 2 or 3 different set of players... The cricketers are more relaxed when it comes to being with fans when in a foreign country.. Security is also less... so you cannot entirely blame the Indian set up. You cant expect them to provide a tight security for a Ranji match where not more than 1000 spectators are expected. There indeed is some amount of security cover provided by a small team of police and the security guards employed by KSCA. But yeah.. if some terrorist decided to make use of this opportunity to do some harm, chances are that he could have managed to do what he wanted to... In that sense you can classify me as a smart ass who has the knack of knowing when to go where to get a chance to have a closer look at my fav cricket heroes.. among top cricketers I have met Sunny, Srikanth, Azhar, Shastri, Sourav, Sachin, Kumble, Srinath, Prasad, Joshi (he was once playing a club match in our college grounds) before this. In fact I had met Dravid in 1996/97 during the Tamil Nadu Vs Karnataka Ranji final at Chennai. But those were times when digital cameras were not around to take a pic and make it memorable (and ofcourse brag about it on internet). If you re really serious about this whole business of watching live cricket, meeting cricketers, you should be ready to invest a good amount of time as well. To start with I had to take time off from office to drive to the stadium (45 mins), wait for the match to finish (1 hour) and then when most of the crowd walked away, quietly slip into the area where there is a chance of getting closer to RD and if I was lucky click a pic (another 1 hour), without even knowing for sure that whether I’ll be able to make it or not.. for all you know, the entire effort would have been wasted had Dravid decided not to come out for the press meet. Last year the day before the Ind / Aus test series started, I went to the stadium in the evening to catch some players as I was confident that they will be practicing in the evening.. My bad luck, both teams completed the practice by noon and decided to go back and rest at the hotel.. I waited for an hour in vain and had to settle with pictures of the Wall that was erected in Chinnaswami stadium in respect of Rahul Dravid.

I did not mean to say that you can simply walk up to a cricketer during Ranji matches.. My general being that, for the same set of players, different standards of security are applied at different moments, based on what match they're playing. Anyways, nice account dude! :two_thumbs_up:

[achilles]

You, my friend, are extremely lucky. :--D

[DomainK]

Dina has become a superstar on ICF.:two_thumbs_up:

[yoda]

Dina, you rock. :two_thumbs_up:

[Karan114]

well you cant quite assume that based on their image.. ppl who appear to be very polite in front of camera have come across as arrogant while in front of fans.. and vice versa... Azhar used to shoo away autograph seekers like they are dogs.. even children.. ts very difficult to catch sachin's attention for an autograph or picture.. sourave' date=' for all his arrogance is very sweet when it comes to handling fans.. before going out to the nets, he'll tell the autograph seekers that he'll finish with the nets and then oblige them (he will show that his hands are inside gloves and hence cannot sign)... i dont want o generalize here. may be during my encounters they have behaved like this and may or may not behave the same way in other instances. after all they are also normal humans like all of us and would have their own mood swings as well...[/quote'] Interesting observations. Have really enjoyed reading your posts in this thread.

[graphic23]

I am very envious. And great report! Thanks for sharing.

[fineleg]

You' date=' my friend, are extremely lucky. :--D[/quote'] 99% perspiration as he described it, 1% luck. Very interesting to read these sort of anecdotes Dinx. Is your wife supportive of the time you spend on kirket? :D

[I_India]

Good one.

[Temujin Khaghan]

well you cant quite assume that based on their image.. ppl who appear to be very polite in front of camera have come across as arrogant while in front of fans.. and vice versa... Azhar used to shoo away autograph seekers like they are dogs.. even children.. ts very difficult to catch sachin's attention for an autograph or picture.. sourave' date=' for all his arrogance is very sweet when it comes to handling fans.. before going out to the nets, he'll tell the autograph seekers that he'll finish with the nets and then oblige them (he will show that his hands are inside gloves and hence cannot sign)... i dont want o generalize here. may be during my encounters they have behaved like this and may or may not behave the same way in other instances. after all they are also normal humans like all of us and would have their own mood swings as well...[/quote'] :hmmm: i even heard that vinod kambli is like an a.s.s.hole when people asked him for autographs.