20 Facts about Sourav Ganguly: The Royal Bengal Tiger

There has been no one in the history of Indian cricket who was as authoritative, influential, and audacious as the ‘Prince of Calcutta’ Sourav Ganguly. Ganguly changed the way the cricketing world perceived India. Under Ganguly’s leadership, India started winning matches and tournaments abroad bit more regularly. There was brashness in every aspect of his game, be it batting or captaincy. ‘Dada’ always wanted to do things in his own way. For him, opponents were always meant to be toppled. Considered as the ‘God of off-side’, his strong cuts and cover drives were a sight of happiness for many. His batting combined aggression with grace and was ranked as one of the most destructive batsmen in limited overs cricket.

1.Born on:

Sourav Chandidas Ganguly was born on July 8, 1972 in the capital city of Calcutta (now Kolkata), West Bengal.

2. The luxurious life:

Sourav Ganguly is the youngest son of Chandidas and Nirupa Ganguly. Sourav belonged to a riches and affluent family in Kolkata. His father Chandidas ran a flourishing print business and was one of the richest men in the city. Sourav’s joint family home in Behala, a suburb in Southern Calcutta, has nearly 30 residing members with more than 45 rooms.

3. The Royal nickname:

Sourav, as a kid was fondly called as ‘Maharaja’ meaning ‘Prince’ by his parents. Later, during his playing career, renowned commentator Geoffrey Boycott had titled him as ‘The Prince of Calcutta.’

4. All facilities at their disposal:

An indoor multi-gym and concrete wicket was built at their home, so he and Snehasish could practice the game.

5. Turns left handed to uses his brothers’ kit:

Sourav is right-handed – he writes right-handed, bowls right handed and basically does each and everything with his right hand. But, because his brother Snehashish was left-handed, Sourav held the bat left-handed so that he could then use his elder brother’s kit.

6. A Football fan at heart:

Sourav was a huge football fan in his childhood (he still is!), and football was actually his first love! But due to Snehashish’s insistence, Sourav was enrolled into a cricket academy during his class 10 holidays.

7. Irony plays its games:

Sourav made his first-class debut in 1989/90 season for Bengal and ironically replaced his elder brother Snehashish in the Ranji Trophy team.

8. International debut:

Sourav Ganguly made his international debut in 1991 after a superb domestic season. However, he was shortly dropped from the team owing to poor performance.

9. Installs a bowling machine at his place to practice:

After getting dropped from the Indian team in 1992, Ganguly had a personal bowling machine installed in his house to practise his batting.

10. The glorious Test debut:

Ganguly made his Test debut against England in 1996. He slammed a ton in the first innings, becoming only the third cricketer to achieve such a feat on debut at Lord’s, after Harry Graham and John Hampshire.

11. The religious person:

Sourav is a deeply religious person and observes a fast every Tuesday

12. The foodie:

Sourav donned the entrepreneur’s hat and opened a three-storey restaurant, Sourav’s – The Food Pavilion in Calcutta’s posh locality Park Street. The restaurant was inaugurated by Sachin himself in 2004.

13. A whole stretch of road named after him:

A 1.5 km road in Rajarhat in the North 24 Parganas district of West Bengal is named after  Sourav. He himself unveiled a plaque containing the new name of the road, Sourav Ganguly Avenue, at a function organised by the Rajarhat Gopalpur Municipality.

14. The man-in-charge, almost on every occasion:

In Australia’s three-Test and five-match ODI tour of India in early 2001, Ganguly caused controversy by arriving late for the toss on four occasions, something which agitated opposition captain Steve Waugh. In the fourth ODI, he caused further controversy by failing to wear his playing attire to the toss, something considered ungentlemanly in cricket.

15. The awesome treble:

He is also one of the five players in the world to achieve amazing treble of 10,000 runs, 100 wickets and 100 catches in ODI cricket history, the others being Tendulkar, Kallis, Sanath Jayasuriya and Tillakaratne Dilshan.

16. The nurturer of talent:

Sourav Ganguly always believed in giving opportunities to young talents. This character attribute of Ganguly saw the birth of future superstars Virender Sehwag, Harbhajan Singh, Yuvraj Singh, Zaheer Khan and couple of others. These four players flourished under Ganguly’s captaincy.

17. Unique feat:

Sourav is the third cricketer in the world, along with Aravinda De Silva and Mahela Jayawardene, to score a 100 and lead a team to the final of a World Cup.

18. One of the greatest ODI batsmen:

In 2002, the Wisden Cricketers’ Almanack ranked him the sixth greatest ODI batsman of all time, next to Viv Richards, Sachin Tendulkar, Brian Lara, Dean Jones and Michael Bevan.

19. The gem of West Bengal:

On 20 May 2013, Ganguly was awarded the Banga Bibhushan Award from the Government of West Bengal. It is a title instituted by the West Bengal Government to honour the services of personalities in various fields.

20. Co-owner of Atlético de Kolkata:

Along with Harshavardhan Neotia, Sanjiv Goenka, Utsav Parekh, and Spanish La Liga side Atlético de Madrid, Ganguly is also the co-owner of Atlético de Kolkata, a franchise of the Indian Super League, which won the inaugural season in 2014.