After a significantly successful campaign spanning across 6 major cities in Pakistan (Karachi, Hyderabad, Lahore, Gujranwala, Multan and Faisalabad), ‘Sprite Cricket Next’, the ground breaking technology driven sporting platform, concluded their first season in a grand Sprite Cricket Next Finale on 30 November 2010 in Lahore, with an innovative competition to discover Pakistan’s best Gulli cricketer.Within the Sprite Cricket Next platform, over 200,000 participants from across the country experienced for the first time ever, state-of-the-art cricketing technology ‘Pitch Vision’*, where participants were able to measure their bowling speed, determine their batting sensibilities and style, and generate statistics such as the fastest ball, average score per over, wagon wheels and pitch maps, resulting in statistics accumulation of the 6 best players across Pakistan; Abdul Wahab of Hyderabad, Waqas Aslam of Gujranwala, Muhammad Owais of Multan, Tauseef Mubarak of Lahore, Umair Haider of Karachi and Rana Adil of Faisalabad, went head to head on 30 November 2010 in Lahore to compete for the prestigious title of ‘Pakistan’s Best Gulli Cricketer’ and a chance to win cash prizes.
The finale involved players being divided into two groups who competed in a round robin stage out of which the top two players, Rana Adil of Faisalabad and Abdul Wahab of Hyderabad, competed in a grand thrilling finale which went to the last ball. The match was divided into two innings with Rana Adil taking a 2 run lead in the first inning. Abdul Wahab managed only 4 runs in his second inning and set a target of 3 runs to win for Rana Adil. The match went to the last delivery with Rana Adil needing 3 runs of it and he struck a boundary to win Sprite Cricket Nexts’ Season One. Rana Adil was received jubilantly by his family and friends who had come especially from Faisalabad to witness his victory. Both bowlers consistently touched speeds of over 140 km/h with Rana Adil bowling one delivery which was recorded at 157 km/h, the fastest for the night. Rana Adil was awarded a cash prize of PKR 25,000, a month’s supply of Sprite and a Cricket Kit on winning the season while the rest of the five players received PKR 10,000 each for their excellent effort in the competition. On winning Sprite Cricket Next Season One Rana Adil has said, “First of all I would like to thank God for everything and then the team at Sprite Cricket next for providing a platform where I got a chance to test my skills and for recognising and rewarding all our efforts to reach this far in the competition.
I am proud that a player from Faisalabad has won the competition and by the grace of God another Faisalabadi will win Sprite Cricket Next’s Season Two.”Expressing her views about the finale for this exciting new sporting platform, Group Brand Manager for the Coca-Cola Export Corporation in Pakistan, Aysha Haider has said, ‘With Sprite Cricket Next, we have provided an ideal opportunity to Gulli players to experience this unique facility, a platform that is usually only available to professionals. Cricket is a big part of our lives and next year, Sprite aims to take this platform to many more Gullicricketers” Indeed without a doubt, cricket is and has always been the number one passion of Pakistanis irrespective of age, background and ethnicity. Mostly, this passion has been translated into what is often regarded as Pakistan’s true form of cricket, ‘Gulli Cricket’ or ‘Street Cricket’. Gulli Cricket has long resonated with Pakistanis and the Gulli form of the game has a deep seated history of having cultivated Pakistan’s passion for cricket. With ‘Sprite Cricket Next’, Sprite has aimed to make Gulli Cricket a recognizable form of cricket and honour the fact that it is the most popular variety of cricket being played in every street and Gulli of Pakistan.
