Rupganj, against all odds

Despite all the hurdles placed in their path, Legends of Rupganj have reached the top of the Dhaka Premier League. They are now on 18 points, one better than Victoria Sporting Club whom they beat by two wickets on Wednesday. One of the most balanced side in the Dhaka league, Rupganj have played some outstanding cricket throughout the first phase and have won both their Super League matches, having already crushed Mohammedan Sporting Club by 104 runs in their first game. Rupganj doesn’t have any of their batsmen among the top 10 run-scorers or wicket-takers in this competition. But their team’s top scorer Mohammad Mithun has scored 394 out of 469 runs in matches won. Asif Ahmed’s 310 runs out of 440 have also come in these matches. Abu Haider and Taijul Islam have taken 15 wickets each. Seasoned campaigner Mosharraf Hossain, Rupganj’s captain, has taken 12 wickets and scored 331 runs. His allround showing has saved them on a number of ocassions, just like in their last game when his 148-run seventh wicket stand with Pawan Negi helped them out of a hole and took them to victory. Unlike some of the other clubs, the Rupganj players are happy because the club is one of the very few to have already paid the 60 per cent of the scheduled payment. They have a small band of supporters too, hailing from Rupganj itself. So far it sounds like a normal Dhaka club, paying their players properly while getting good performance out of them. But Rupganj is no ordinary club. It is owned by Lutfar Rahman Badal, banned for life by the Bangladesh Cricket Board in December last year, for his outburst against board president Nazmul Hassan and two other directors. Their general secretary Tarikul Islam and team manager Sabbir Ahmed were also handed five- and three-year bans respectively. It is not the healthiest place for players when officials are in trouble. Players are wary of playing for Rupganj given their record of antagonising the current cricket board, but due to the players’ draft this year, the cricketers didn’t really have a choice to make. This year though the players have been impressed by their ability to clear payments on time. More importantly, controversial decisions in some of their matches also galvanised this unit. The captain Mosharraf said they have great unity, which could help them to the DPL title this season. “We have gone through all the difficulties but still we wanted to give our best for Rupganj. You may have noticed the two games - one against Kalabagan Krira Chakra where few decisions went against us and the abandoned match against Brothers Union. If things went our way in these games, we might have been the champions already. Our main strength is unity which helped us to give our best and I hope we have the ability to clinch the title this time,” Mosharraf told Dhaka Tribune yesterday. In their game against Kalabagan, Mashrafe Mortaza’s overthrow should have been given them six runs instead the umpires awarded them five. In the same game, Rupganj complained that the umpires called play off early after it stopped raining, awarding Kalabagan the win through Duckworth/Lewis method. Two days later, the Cricket Committee of Dhaka Metropolis slapped Mosharraf and Mithun with a one-game suspension each and fined Khaled Mashud and their manager Sabbir, though he is already suspended. In their next game against Sheikh Jamal Dhanmondi Club, Soumya Sarkar was one of three batsmen to give out leg-before, for which he protested and was duly fined for the outburst against the umpires and match referee. Still they won the game by seven wickets and made it to the Super League stage. They couldn’t make it to the top of the points table in the first stage after their game against Brothers Union was abandoned after two days of washout. There is strong rumour that Brothers Union officials allegedly forced the BKSP-3 groundsmen to leave the ground and not protect the pitch, to ensure one point which helped them stay above the relegation zone. The game robbed Rupganj of a point, which could have helped them further in the competition’s business end. But as they showed in their narrow win over the in-form Victoria, Rupganj will not give up without a proper fight.