AFTER a fairly successful career as a Ranji Trophy player for Hyderabad, 37-year-old A Nandakishore will make his debut as an umpire when he officiates in the South Zone Women’s Cricket Championship at Anantapur on Friday. He will thus become the first Ranji player from Hyderabad to don the role of an umpire. "It is a great opportunity for me to represent my country as an umpire," said the former Hyderabad skipper.
With the Cricket Board encouraging former players to take up umpiring job, Nandakishore passed all the tests to qualify as first class umpire. His first big test will come on Friday when he will officiate in the Andhra versus Kerala match. He will umpire in five matches in this tournament. It will be a first big learning experience for this mild-mannered former opener, who had a career-best knock of 213 against Karnataka at Gymkhana in 2001. It was easily one of the highlights of his career. He represented Hyderabad in 76 Ranji matches after making his debut in 1994 against Kerala.
Nandakishore also had the distinction of captaining the city team in seven matches in the 2001-02 season. "I think the captaincy was an unexpected honour," recalls Nanda. Averaging 37 after scoring 4,396 runs with nine hundreds, this Andhra Bank officer, hung his flannels in the 2004 after playing his last match against Tamil Nadu. "I had no regrets. In fact, I’m happy to play for Hyderabad and was fortunate to play alongside some of the great players like VVS Laxman, Venkatapathy Raju, MV Sridhar, Kanwaljit Singh and Narenderpal Singh. I had some best moments of my cricketing career along with these players. I was roommate of VVS for most of the matches. It was a great education for me as we could discuss a lot about the game. It was a privilege to have the legend like late ML Jaisimha as coach. He was like a father figure to most of the players," said Nanda. After retiring, Nanda served Hyderabad as a selector before taking his interest in umpiring. "I think it was Sivaram who goaded me to take this job. He gave me a lot of encouragement. He has been my mentor," says Nanda, who took orientation course form former ICC umpire VK Ramaswamy.Nanda expects his experience, as first class player will help him as an umpire. "As a player, it will help me to conduct the match more smoothly. I always believe that umpires are facilitators," said Nanda.
According to Nanda, concentration, focus, patience, dedication and to be well versed with laws are important to become a successful umpire.
