The Hindu : New Delhi News : Cricketers on a different pitch

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Apr 30, 2004

New Delhi

New Delhi

Cricketers on a different pitch

By Anjali Dhal Samanta

NEW DELHI, APRIL 29. The young cricketers of Team India walked on a different pitch on Thursday night. And this time the brave hearts did not don the war paint. Instead, a different spin and a new avatar, members of the Indian cricket team -- sporting the look of popular singer, Enrique Iglesias and Cuban drug mafia kings -- walked the ramp here as part of the ongoing Lakme India Fashion Week.

The four sportsmen -- Zaheer Khan, Irfan Pathan, Harbhajan Singh and Mohammed Kaif -- "Sparked the Night" as they catwalked along with popular models like Sheetal Mallar, Michelle, Tapur Chatterjee and Jesse Randhawa during a show by Samsung. While Zaheer walked with the practiced ease of a "model", Harbhajan enjoyed himself on the ramp as he danced in tune with the music. Finishing the line-up came Mohammed Kaif who looked almost embarrassed to be in the spotlight.

While the look for the cricketers was designed by duo - Shantanu and Nikhil, a team of five designers including Priyadarshini Rao, Aparna Chandra, Puja Nayyar and Ranna Gill worked on the show. Following the theme for the evening "Spark the Night", the Shantanu and Nikhil choose to give a "pop-star, young, icon-kind of look" to the cricketers. "We have taken the suave and young look of Iglesias and white and linen look of the Cuban drug mafia," said Nikhil who choose to work with a palette of Aqua blue and white.

"It was a real challenge designing for the cricketers and at the same time it was a lot of fun. Because they are after all normal people and to make them look like models wasn't very easy! But it was good fun. And some of these guys are no less than models - Zaheer for example has an excellent jaw line and great physique. Dressing him up was a lot of fun," says designer Nikhil Mehra.

Besides the catwalk by the cricketers, the show - choreographed by Harmeet Bajaj - saw Puja Nayyar and Ranna Gill present a collection similar to their ramp show earlier this week. Designer Priyadarshini Rao's collection mood was also similar to what has been presented earlier. A lot of gold and metallic embellishments, ivory, white, black, neon, pinks, reds and oxidized silver were spotted on the ramp.

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