2022
Hello Local Guides,
I am Vishal Yadav, a proud level 6 Local Guide from India and has been on the platform since 2017.. And trust me, I have enjoyed every bit of this journey. (My smile says it all)
I run a project called as Female Cricket (www.femalecricket.com), which aims to promote and publicize women's cricket in and around the world.
Most of you would agree that cricket is not just a sport, but a festival here in India. But over the years I have realized that there is a lot of disparity and imbalances when it comes to women's cricket. Lack of exposure, lack of awareness, not enough places to learn cricket and little visibility on the future avenues are some of the major challenges faced by female cricketers around the world.
Girls want to play and learn cricket but they don't know where to go, where to find these local clubs and academies to enroll (PS: You shall find 10 cricket clubs / academies for boys in a city, but hardly 1-2 clubs / academies exclusive for girls). Although these local clubs/academies do exist, but the problem is locating them since most of them aren't added on Google Maps. To mitigate these challenges, I have come up with a solution. I have built a website called "www.femalecricketclub.com" through which we are asking locals to help us with the basic information about their nearby cricket clubs/academies.
Once I have this basic information, I shall validate it myself by calling/visiting concerned owners and verifying their addresses. Once we have this information, our 50% of the problem is solved. And to solve the remaining 50%, we will take help of Google Maps. What better way than to add these missing places on Google Maps and help thousands find their way to these places 🙂
We are doing this pilot project in India and post its success, we shall replicate the model in other countries as well.
Women's cricket was never given much importance but post the success of Indian team in the Women's Cricket World Cup 2017, things have changed here drastically. The acceptance has increased, people have started acknowledging the efforts and are also pushing their daughters / sisters to take up cricket as a profession. Through Female Cricket, I received several calls / emails from girls and their parents asking us the details. So I thought of starting a cricket academy myself exclusively for girls here in Mumbai, India. I inaugurated the academy on 2nd November 2017 which is currently home to 35+ female aspirants in the city.
I soon listed this academy on Google Maps and started getting lot of inquiries from people all around the city. Even today, I get most of the registrations from Google Maps than any other source.
I personally cannot start a new cricket academy in every city of India due to resource constraints, but can definitely add these missing and existing clubs/academies on Google Maps and help girls across India kick-start their cricket career.
I will keep writing on the Connect and keep you all posted with the progress & impact we make through this project. I will add 200+ missing cricket club / academies by end of this year, especially in tier-2, tier-3 cities of India.
I cannot wait to meet you Google in October this year at Connect Live and share my lovely experiences and progress during this journey. It will be fun.
And as promised, I have started adding missing cricket clubs / academies on Google Maps. This is for all the girls in Pune, India looking out for a place to practice and kick start their cricket career. The suggestion was received on the website : http://femalecricketclub.com/
Watch out this space for more updates and progress on this beautiful journey.
I am super thrilled to have added another cricket club from Pune, India.
This club is the brainchild of Hemant Anand Kinikar (born 6 December 1971) who is an Indian former first-class cricketer who played for Maharashtra. He became a cricket coach after his playing career.
Facebook Page Link
I am super excited to be working on this wonderful project and as promised earlier, I have already started listing cricket clubs / academies where girls can enroll and practice.
These places existed from a long time, but were never added on Google Maps. I am glad that with the help of Google Maps, girls can easily locate these clubs and kick start their cricket career. 🙂
This is just the beginning. I plan to add at least 200 such clubs and academies on Google Maps from across India.
Will keep this community posted with more updates and progress on this journey.