He’ll be famous if he lives beyond his first birthday, an astrologer told little Gopu’s worried parents when he had to undergo a major operation within days of his birth.
Gopu turned 30 in February. And he is certainly famous, though some may want to use the word notorious. Santhakumaran Sreesanth — or just Sreesanth, as he is known — has consumed more newsprint and airtime than he ever did as a cricketer.
Earlier this week, the Delhi Police accused the pace bowler — and two other cricketers — of taking money from bookies to give away runs. The police say he has confessed, but his lawyer and family are not convinced. “He is innocent,” says his brother, Deepu Santhan, camping in Delhi since the arrest on Thursday. “We believe in God and the truth will prevail.”
When Sreesanth was growing up, his father always reminded him of the astrologer’s prediction, especially when the boy faltered. And when he flowered, the family made sure they were behind him.
Like all little boys, he played — and loved — cricket. But when he was nine he was selected to play for the Ernakulam Cricket Club’s under-13 team — prompting his parents to send him to Bangalore to study so that he could play a better game. Sreesanth stayed with his married sister in Vidyaranyapura on the outskirts of Bangalore and studied at Florence Public School, which was known for its cricketing facilities.
“I honestly don’t know how well he played cricket but I remember that he was a very good break dancer, and we used to call him Michael Jackson. He won many competitions,” batchmate Ravi Kumar recalls. “He was also good at painting.”
The creative genes run in his family. While his father Shantakumaran Nair, a retired Life Insurance Corporation of India manager, has acted in Malayalam films, his mother Savithri Devi, a government servant, was a dancer. One of his sisters, Nivedita, is a television actress while the other, Divya Madhu, is married to playback singer Madhu Balakrishnan. His brother runs a music company.
“Sree is a good singer, dancer and cricketer,” says Pranav Nair, a schoolgoing cousin. “Whenever we cousins get together he starts singing. Music is his passion.”
In fact, when he was going through a lean spell in cricket some years ago, he formed a band called S36. S, he told a reporter, stood for Sreesanth and 36 was the number on a jersey that he wore for a winning match. Nine is his lucky number, which 3 and 6 add up to. His four cars — two of them BMWs — bear the registration number 9.
Bandmate Deepak Warrier says Sreesanth plays the drum and the piano and also writes lyrics. “He is a great fan of Western rock, but also loves Carnatic classical. There are eight of us in the band. We have performed in many IPL shows too,” says Warrier, who met him through his brother. Sreesanth also writes poetry and wrote the lyrics for an album released just before the ODI World Cup in 2007.
But while music is one of his loves, cricket clearly is his passion. And he has worked hard for it too. Sreesanth used to get on to his bicycle at 5.15am, ride 16km to the Karnataka State Cricket Association grounds and then cycle another 8km to his school, writes journalist K.R. Guruprasad in his book Going Places: India’s Small Town Cricket Heroes.
But his cricketing skills went unnoticed in Bangalore. Krishna Bhatt, once a budding batsman who used to be with Sreesanth in the Brijesh Patel Cricket Academy’s summer camp in the late Nineties, says that few saw potential in him.
“But he was aggressive even then. Many of us who came from middle-class families thought that he was a bit of a mad cap on the ground. But otherwise he was quite a nice chap,” says Bhatt, now a marketing manager at a multinational company in Bangalore.
Sony Cheravathur, Sreesanth’s buddy and former Ranji Trophy captain for Kerala, believes that his aggression is just a way of expressing confidence. “Even as a little boy, Sreesanth would stare at senior players during their game,” he says.
Cheravathur believes that he was once not selected in the under-13 district team despite getting six wickets because he had been suspended for snatching his cap from the umpire after bowling an over. “He told me that the umpire had been unfair to him by not declaring the batsman out. From then on he became a controversial figure.”
After failing to make it to any age group team in Bangalore, Sreesanth went back to Ernakulam after Class X to study commerce at the Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan College. It was in Ernakulam that he rekindled his interest in cricket. He went on to represent the Ernakulam Cricket Club and made it to the district team and later the Kerala state team.
“He wore his heart on his sleeve when he was on the cricket field. I have known him since he was 10, and he always remained the same,” says Jayesh George, honorary secretary, Ernakulam District Cricket Association.
Others have not been similarly impressed by Sreesanth’s conduct on the cricket field. Says Ajit Wadekar, former India captain, “I have seen Sreesanth from 65 metres away and I found him very showy. He was too aggressive — a trait common to cricketers of his generation. Even when they bowl out tailenders, they look at them like they’re Don Bradman.”
During the NKP Salve Challenger Trophy in 2005 Sreesanth suddenly burst on the national cricket scene. Playing for India B, he is said to have sledged Sachin Tendulkar after taking his wicket in one of the matches. Sreesanth was the Player of the Series in the tournament for his excellent bowling and soon made it to the Indian ODI team.
And since then, of course, he has often been in the news — sometimes for all the wrong reasons. But the spotlight on him has never been as harsh as it is now.
According to his lawyer Deepak Prakash, Sreesanth was coming out of a party in Mumbai when he was arrested. “He was initially in shock when the police told him he was being arrested. But he is very calm now as he knows that he is innocent,” Prakash says.
It’s not surprising that he was coming out of a party, for Sreesanth has always been a party animal. Inspector S. Murli, officer in charge of the Ashok Nagar Police Station in Bangalore, recalls that he and his friends were hauled up in 2008 when a complaint was filed against them by the Elgin Apartment Residents’ Association — located in Bangalore’s upmarket Langford Town area — for playing loud music till late into the night. No formal case was, however, filed.
“The complainant alleged that they had refused to quiet down despite a request by the association,” recalls Murli. “A police official was sent to the apartment, where some youngsters, including Sreesanth, were partying. They were given a warning and let off.”
In Bangalore, such Sreesanth stories are not uncommon. The local buzz goes that he owns two apartments there, one in the posh White House complex, a stone’s throw from where cricketer Robin Uthappa lives. The two are good friends and have restaurants in Bangalore and Kochi.
But Cheravathur remembers the time when Sreesanth lived in a rented house at Edapally in Kochi. “He loved that house and sometime in 2004 told me he would love to buy it if he made more money.”
A man with many facets, he is also God-fearing and superstitious. A Hindu, Sreesanth often goes to St Anthony’s Church in Kochi. His arms are inked with tattoos of symbols of various religions.
Lawyer Prakash agrees that he is a believer, and describes him as a sensitive person. “But in a crisis like this, he is very calm and composed.”
The chubby-faced right-arm fast medium bowler loves dressing well and eating out. He has also over the years been linked with various actresses, including Riya Sen after they both appeared in a jewellery ad. He was linked to Telugu actress Neeksha Patel and south Indian star Lakshmi Rai. Prakash says he has many friends in Bollywood, including stars such as Priyanka Chopra.
With fame, endorsements have also come his way. At the height of his career, he used to endorse a bevy of brands like Nike, SB Global Educational Resources, real estate firm Mather and the Muthoot Pappachan Group.
“Sreesanth had a persona which is very different from the other, regular cricketers. He was seen as brash, arrogant and in-your-face. These traits work for brands that target the youth,” Bangalore-based brand consultant Harish Bijoor says. “But corporate brands usually look for endorsers that have a wholesome, family image — Dhoni and Dravid fit the bill,” he says.
In 2009, film director Aashiq Abu made a Malayalam film called Daddy Cool where the main character, Srikant, resembled the bowler.
“I met Sreesanth a couple of times and he even liked the script,” Abu says. “I wanted him to play the character initially but then he had a busy schedule so he couldn’t give dates for the shoot.”
But this scandal may have scotched his chances of getting film roles in future. Although, as Dr B.P. Bam, a Nashik-based sports psychologist who has helped the likes of Sachin Tendulkar, says, “There are no role models left. Every role model has feet of clay.”
So is his cricketing career — to say nothing of music and movies — over? Most say yes, but with Sreesanth, one never knows. Warrier points out that six months ago, when he had injured his toe and was on a wheelchair (Cheravathur adds that he’d had two platinum screws implanted into his feet in the UK), he would watch videos of his best performing cricket matches to motivate himself. “And not just that, he would jam with us too to keep his spirits up.”
One of the tattoos inked on his arm translates into faith. Sreesanth would need a bit of that.
Seven Sins of Sreesanth
Dec 16, 2006: Fined 30 per cent match fee for ‘conduct contrary to the spirit of the game’ for his reaction after getting Hashim Amla’s wicket.
Jul 30, 2007: Fined half of his match fee for shouldering England captain Michael Vaughan during a Test match at Trent Bridge.
April 25, 2008: Harbhajan Singh allegedly slaps Sreesanth soon after the match between Mumbai Indians and Kings XI Punjab. Singh banned from IPL 1. Sreesanth let off with warning.
October 22, 2008: A software engineer lodges complaint with the Cubbon Park police in Bangalore that Sreesanth’s car had rammed into his.
Nov 08, 2008: Elgin Apartment Residents’ Association in Bangalore complains against Sreesanth’s late-night party in his rented apartment. Police let him off after a warning.
Oct 4, 2009: Docked 60 per cent match fee for abusing Mumbai’s Dhawal Kulkarni in Nagpur during Irani Cup match between Rest of India and Mumbai.
April 12, 2013: Sreesanth tweets blaming Harbhajan Singh for the 2008 ‘slapgate’ incident. Calls Harbhajan a ‘backstabbing person’.
Milestones
Oct 25, 2005: Makes ODI debut vs Sri Lanka at Nagpur.
March 1, 2006: Makes Test debut vs England at Nagpur.
Dec 15, 2006: His match effort of 8/99 results in Indian victory in Johannesburg. Declared Man of the Match.
Sep 24, 2007: Takes catch of Misbah-ul-Haq of Pakistan in last over of the Twenty20 World Cup final. India wins World Cup.
April 2, 2011: Part of Indian team that wins the ODI World Cup.
Additional reporting by Sonia Sarkar in Calcutta, Varuna Verma in Bangalore and Smitha Verma in Delhi
