Keen student Bugga hits double but Mount set up Raghubir title clash with Carpediem India

At a time when most people descend on Delhi to learn cricket, Arnav S Bugga bucked the trend and left Delhi for Bhopal to learn the game.

Bugga, who scored a double century in a lost cause on Monday (June 3), as his team LB Shastri Cricket Coaching Club went down in the semi-final of 47th Lala Raghubir Singh Memorial Cricket Tournament to Mount Cricket Club by a mere nine runs.

“The target of 376 (in 40 overs) was never out of reach for us. I thought I just need to stay in the middle to keep scoring,” said Bugga, who is just 16 and led Delhi under-16s over the last two seasons. He made 400 in the 2023-24 season gone by and 560 in the season prior to that (2022-23).

The left-handed batsman was up against a spin attack as Mount bowled only one medium-pacer on a batting surface.

On way to 200 off 102 balls, he hit 14 sixes and 18 fours.

Bugga is one of those cricketers who have not neglected his academics.

The 16-year-old secured 86% in class 10th and then earned 75% in class 11th.  

“I try to study online after practice,” said the Rohini lad, who stays at the residential academy of Sanjay Bhardwaj in Ratibad on the outskirts of Bhopal.

“His school is in Delhi and doesn’t attend it. However, he manages to get good marks. He is a bright student. He has physics, biology and mathematics in high school. He is balancing both,” adds Bhardwaj, who has trained the likes of Gautam Gambhir, Unmukt Chand among others.

Bugga had first approached Bhardwaj in 2016 when he was just eight.

“I told his mother to bring him when he is 10. She brought him back but by then I had left the academy in Ashok Vihar. She found out that I had shifted the academy at Hiranki on Karnal Road. She came with him there,” recalls Bhardwaj.

When Bhardwaj moved to Bhopal, he took a few cricketers including Bugga along with him.

Bugga’s older brother, who also played cricket but briefly, then moved to Bhopal to do MBBS from Gandhi Medical College. He is now in his second year.

Mount Cricket will now face Carpediem India in the final on Thursday (June 5). Carpediem India had beaten Players Academy by two wickets in the second semi-final on June 2, that is, on Sunday.  

Tags : Cricket, Lala Raghubir Cricket, Delhi