The Rediff interview/ Parthiv Patel

'The stint I had in Australia has helped'

Parthiv Patel is likely to be the most overworked member of the Under 19 squad that will shortly take part in the Junior World Cup -- he is the side's wicket keeper, opening batsman, and captain all rolled into one.

The 16-year-old student of class 12 has had to give studies a miss this year, but for now his focus is on the upcoming tournament, where India will take the field as defending champions.

"We will work hard, our goal is to win the tournament," says Parthiv, who had earlier led the Under-17 squad that won the Asia Cup in Dhaka last year. "We have put in a lot of hard work and I hope that stands us in good stead in the tournament. The team spirit is pretty good, we were together in Bangalore for about 20 days, which helped us to get to know one another, and we basically worked on our fielding which is a bit weak.

“The training stint I had in Australia, at the Australian Cricket Academy, thanks to the Border-Gavaskar scholarship , definitely has helped. At the Academy we worked a lot on the fitness aspect of things. We worked with machines a lot, practicing strokes for hours and hours. (Former Australian wicket keeper and now director of the Academy) Rodney Marsh worked with me on my wicket - keeping, we even had a seminar where we were taught how to interact with the media," says Parthiv.

The twin responsibilities of keeping wickets and opening the batting sit lightly on his shoulders. "I've been doing both jobs since my Under-14 days, so I've gotten pretty used to the workload," he shrugs.

Photograph: Jewella C Miranda

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