From Mumbai to the US: Saurabh Netravalkar's long route to taking on the best

Ask any sportsperson how hard it is to quit in the prime of your career. Saurabh Netravalkar knows it too well. He was 23 when he had to make a career choice between cricket and engineering. The left-arm pacer from Mumbai took the call to pursue higher studies in the United States, leaving behind his cricket dreams in India. It was two years after his Mumbai Ranji Trophy debut in 2013, against Karnataka which included his India Under-19 teammate KL Rahul.

As Rahul, along with other 2010 U-19 World Cup players Mayank Agarwal and Jaydev Unadkat, chalked their journey towards the senior India cap and an IPL contract, Netrawalkar took the tough call of leaving the sport in order to pursue a Masters in Computer Science degree at Cornwell University.

“It was a very emotional decision for me to sort of leave cricket behind and come to the US to pursue higher education,” he says over the phone from Dallas, Texas.

But once a cricketer, always a cricketer. The software engineer thus found a way to start his game again in the US and went on to captain the US national team.

"I am grateful to destiny that it gave me a second chance to pursue cricket again here and very lucky to balance it with my full-time job as a software engineer," he says.

For the left-arm pacer, playing professional cricket was never a straightforward decision. Being a bright computer science student from one of the most reputed engineering colleges in the country - Mumbai’s Sardar Patel Institute of Technology - there is always the pull of securing a rewarding job overseas. Which Netravalkar, currently in a well-paying job at Oracle, did.

For a player like Netravalkar, therefore, playing cricket again is not about the money the game offers. The adrenaline rush comes from matching your skills against the world’s best. In the World Cup qualifiers held in June, he pitted his wits against players of Sri Lanka and West Indies, but these two outfits are no longer world beaters. It is the ongoing Major League Cricket T20 tournament that has finally provided him the platform to compete against top professionals.

Picked in the draft by Washington Freedom, his ambition was realised in the game against San Francisco Unicorns played last week. To be the standout bowler in an attack that has pace sensation Anrich Nortje (IPL’s fastest bowler) and the talented Marco Jansen takes some doing. The Mumbaikar's figures of six wickets for just nine runs made people sit up and take notice of his skills. His scalps included Australia’s T20 stars Marcus Stoinis, Matthew Wade and Pakistan all-rounder Shadab Khan.

"It was always a dream to play against top players and see where you are at. I am really grateful to get that chance finally," the 31-year-old cricketer says about his effort which helped Washington Freedom defend a meagre 133 and qualify for the MLC play-offs.

“It didn’t seem until it happened. (It’s) Later, I realised I got some big names. At that time I wasn't thinking about who the batter is. It worked. Stoinis, Shadab and Wade were my first three wickets.”

“It is a big step for cricket in US to have a tournament of this scale. It has been very exciting to play alongside some of the current top international players. I am really grateful for that. It is a kind of an upscale for us, where it challenges us local players in the US to raise our standards and that’s what I like about it. It was a challenge for me. At the same time, it feels very good that the hard work I am doing is paying off. I get a validation that I am on the right track if I keep working hard, I can perform at this level.”

He adds: “This is just a start, one performance won’t mean anything. Now my goal is to keep upscaling and try to be consistent.”

The names he is up against in the MLC can be intimidating. On the top of your run-up the best freeze when Stoinis takes guard. But, the hard yards in Mumbai and Indian cricket are helping Netravalkar. “Definitely (the experience gives me the edge), during my under-19 days also, I had faced good competition. I remember in 2009 we played the BCCI Corporate Trophy, I played in the Air India side, captained by then India star, Yuvraj Singh. Suresh Raina was playing, they were all current India players. I did well in that tournament and that performance had led me to get picked in the India Under-19 team. It was too long back, but I knew if I work hard, I can do well. Then the Mumbai attitude - never leave the game, fight till the end - that also helped me.”

Compared to the professional cricketers in India who can focus full-time on their sport, Netrawalkar’s engineering job at San Francisco, demands proper effort. He is balancing it well though. “I am a software engineer, so I have to mostly code. The timings are flexible, which is a good thing about this profession. So I can work at my own time."