‘Kaun Pravin Tambe,’ a cricket biopic starring Shreyas Talpade, depicts the tribulations of 50-year-old Indian cricketer Pravin Tambe, who made his IPL debut after years of club cricket in Mumbai. Anjali Patil, Parambrata Chatterjee, and Ashish Vidyarthi feature in the Jayprad Desai-directed film. The film was released on the Disney+Hotstar OTT platform.
The film is the ideal answer for anyone who is unfamiliar with the aforementioned cricket personalities or who is not a fanatical cricket fan. You might be wondering why a biopic about a cricketer who isn’t well-known should be made. There are various reasons for this, but the most important is that it is a typical case of an undeterred dark horse, which is exactly the kind of tale that cinema needs to convey.
Who is Pravin Tambe?
This Indian leg-spinner and all-rounder catapulted to popularity at the age of 41 when he was selected by Rajasthan Royals to play in the Indian Premier League in 2013. He had played tennis-ball cricket and club cricket in Mumbai for 20 years and had never played a single high-level match.
Pravin was born with a wooden spoon, like countless other cricketers, from the less-than-glorious side of Maximum City. Despite this, he managed to avoid everything that stood in his way of pursuing his solitary passion, Cricket. The fact that he tried to secure a berth in Ranji at the ripe old age of 40 adds to the intrigue of his story.
Tambe was the definition of guts and persistence, pursuing his objectives despite reaching an age when even the most famous cricketers retire. In the process, he overcame unfathomable challenges, continued to provide for his family, and never lost his love for cricket. Shreyas Talpade has effectively shown all of this on-screen.
Tambe began playing gully cricket in the Mumbai suburbs when he was 15 years old. Tambe played for the Parsee Cyclists Sports Club in the 1995-96 season of domestic competition in Mumbai’s D division as a medium-paced bowler. Following that, he played for the Parsee Gymkhana in the B division. He finally joined the Shivaji Park Gymkhana’s A division, which has produced top-level players such as Shreyas Iyer, Vijay Manjrekar, and Ajit Wadekar, as well as the Gupte siblings Baloo and Subhash.
To make ends meet, he took on part-time work while continuing to practise and compete in tournaments organised by the Mumbai Cricket Association, in which firms compete in four levels. Tambe, a medium-paced bowler, switched to wrist-spinning after his captain asked him to deliver leg-spin during a crucial match. During this match, he came across Abey Kuruvilla, India’s fast bowler and Mumbai’s fast bowler. Kuruvilla went on to become the sports director at DY Patil Sports Academy and a selector at the BCCI (Board of Control for Cricket in India).
Tambe earned a job as a Liason Officer in the early years of the IPL, when matches were held at the DY Patil stadium, thanks to Kuruvilla’s recommendation. In an attempt to replace an injured player, he was given an 11th-hour opportunity to play for DY Patil’s A squad in an invitational T20 tournament. During the match, he was, however, completely unaware that Rajasthan Royals scouts were watching him.
Dravid called Kuruvilla months later, requesting that Tambe be sent to RR in Jaipur. Tambe, on the other hand, did not play a single IPL match, but it did not stop him from winning the Golden Wicket Award for taking the most wickets in the Champions League T20 that season. His Ranji dream came true this year as he was selected to represent Mumbai in two first-class matches.
Tambe etched history by dismissing Manish Pandey, Yusuf Pathan, and Ryan ten Doeschate with a 2-ball hat-trick off a wide delivery and two legal deliveries in a memorable encounter against KKR in IPL 2014. Tambe was named Man of the Match and wore the purple cap (for getting the most wickets) until the tournament’s final match. MS Dhoni, an Indian cricket legend and former CSK captain, was also taken out by him.
We empathize with him, root for him, and eventually hail him for never conceding defeat despite several obstacles as we become aware of his talent and unsuccessful attempts to gain national attention.
