First big brand icon of cricket, Kapil Dev will yet again don the India colours. Good 24 years after he has walked out for the one last time with the Indian cricket team at Faridabad’s Nahar Cricket Stadium in October 1994.
Former Indian cricket team captain and a legend in his own right, Kapil Dev is set to represent India. But this time the man who became world’s best with his trade of swinging deliveries with a cricket ball, will be executing the craft of swinging golf clubs.
The 1983 cricket World Cup-winning captain has been selected for the Indian golf team that will take part in the 2018 Asia Pacific Seniors from October 17 to 19 at the Tom Watson Golf Club in Miyazaki, Japan.
The 59-year-old ICC Cricket Hall of Famer booked the berth for the Japan tour on the basis of his performance in the All India Senior Tournament at the JP Greens Golf Course in Noida earlier in July.
Kapil Dev is an ardent golf fan who was introduced to the sport by one of his close friends in 1994. Since then, the flamboyant icon has been nurturing a serious ambition to represent India in Golf. He is a regular at the iconic Delhi Golf Club.
Kapil felt ecstatic after making the cut. “I am happy. Actually, I feel proud because I am going to represent India. It is a great feeling. Not quite different from the time I was picked to tour Pakistan (in 1978) as part of the Indian cricket team,” Kapil Dev had told national daily The Hindu.
However, this is not the only winning streak of Kapil Dev’s second innings with Golf. He had also qualified for the 2015 edition of the tournament that was held in China.
Kapil will be representing the Indian tri-colours in Japan alongside Rishi Narain and Amit Luthra, the respective winners of 2018 and 2015 senior nationals. Any male golfer aged 55 years or above meets the qualifications criteria for the Asia Pacific Seniors.
Kapil announced his retirement from cricket in 1994 after breaking former Kiwi player Richard Hadlee’s then standing record for the most Test wickets taken. His post-retirement journey has been nothing short of thrills and excitement. He took the charge of the Indian national cricket team as a coach in 1999, succeeding Anshuman Gaekwad. He joined the Indian Territorial Army as an honorary officer in 2008. He was commissioned as a Lieutenant Colonel by General Deepak Kapoor, then Chief of the Indian Armed Forces.
Kapil’s second innings of his glorious cricket career saw him becoming one of the prominent brand and TV icons and a regular speaker in various cricket talk shows. One of the greatest all-rounders in the annals of cricket, he has endorsed some of the well-known brands such as Palmolive and Rapidex English Speaking Course.
Among the feathers of his exquisite cap, Kapil is the first in the history of cricket to take 200 ODI Wickets. He is the only player in the history of cricket to have taken more than 400 wickets, 434 to be precise, and scored more than 5,000 runs in Tests. He was named by Wisden as the Indian Cricketer of the Century in 2002, cricket world’s most coveted and prestigious honours.
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