It is not easy to remain attached with cricket after an influential administrator tells you in your face that he would ensure that you wouldn't be picked ever again in any of the state teams. In most cases, people would quit the game altogether.
Not Rajasthan batsman Nikhil Doru, now 37. He was axed from the Rajasthan team even after scoring a century in his last innings in Ranji Trophy, in December 2009. But he kept going and showing a lot of perseverance, on Thursday, staged a sensational comeback to first-class cricket after almost seven years when he was picked in the Railways playing XI against Gujarat in a Ranji Trophy match that started in Lahli, Haryana.
But it is not just perseverance of the diminutive Doru that needs to be applauded; it is determination to remain motivated despite his advancing age, which is always a major factor that can go against anyone nursing ambition of staging a comeback after a long gap. On Thursday, Doru staged the comeback at 37 years and 271 days – an age when most cricketers have either retired or on the verge of doing that.
"My feeling on staging a comeback is almost the same as what I felt on my debut in December 2009. Today, I felt like I am making my first-class debut – the same excitement and anxiety that I felt on my debut against Vidarbha,”" Doru told Outlook from Lahli.
Asked about his fresh goal, now that he has finally staged a comeback, Doru, playing his 66th match currently, said: "I would like to play as long as possible; at least for the next two seasons, if not more. When I started playing my aim was to play at least 100 first-class matches. Let us see how many matches I end up with."
Doru has been employed with the Indian Railways since 2004 but played for Rajasthan till now. He staged the comeback riding on a prolific India-Railway Tournament held recently. Captaining North-Western Railway, he scored 419 runs – the highest aggregate among all competing teams. His tally included a century each in the quarter-finals against Metro Railways (Kolkata) and semi-finals against North Central Railways, which helped his team win the title for the first time ever in the tournament's 63-year history.
Then, in a Railways' practice game against Andhra Pradesh in Gwalior, Doru continued his fine form, forcing the selectors to pick him for the Ranji Trophy. He was promptly picked among the probables, and after sitting out in the first two Ranji Trophy matches, he staged the grand comeback as a No.4 batsman against Gujarat in Lahli on Thursday.
Doru was dropped by Rajasthan not on cricketing reasons when he was trying to stage comeback to the Rajasthan team after having played 65 first-class matches.
In 2012, during a local tournament in Udaipur, the home town of Doru, he and a player from an opponent team were locked in an on-field fight. A top Udaipur-based cricket administrator belonging to a royal family, who held a position of influence in the Rajasthan Cricket Association, apparently told Doru's family that he would ensure that he was never selected for the state.
That statement has rankled Doru since then, but it also made him more determined to stage a comeback. In his bid to return to competitive cricket, he also filed a petition in the Jaipur bench of the Rajasthan High Court in January last year.
"I was dropped without justifiable cricketing reasons. I was very frustrated and had no other option but to take the legal course," he says. Doru made three prayers in his petition: he be selected in the Rajasthan Ranji team on the basis of performance; restrain two "biased" selectors from being part of the Rajasthan selection committee; and, award him "suitable compensation" due to "bias".
That case is still going on, with the option of seeking compensation still open to him. Although Doru is not completely ready to give up on the case, he is currently not pursuing it vigorously as he wants to concentrate on his cricket.
Even as Doru is ageing, he has maintained his fitness and looks remarkably fit and agile at the moment. The other day, he fielded as a substitute fielder with the enthusiasm of a youngster in the game against Punjab in New Delhi.
Fielding comes naturally to Doru. His father, a mining engineer, was a national-level 200-metre sprinter. "Fitness was never a problem for me. And fielding is the first thing that selectors see if an ageing player tries to stage a comeback. On this count, I ticked the box as I was completely match fit," says the lean and mean-looking player. "The other factor is form and here too I was among the runs in the Inter-Railway matches, and that helped in my selection."
