When Pavan Deshpande’s phone had 47 missed calls

Passion can make us do crazy things. In a country like India where, to use the cliched phrase, cricket is a religion, you could probably throw a stone and hit an aspiring cricketer. The glitz and the glamour of cricket might appear bright, but the passion for the game is where it all begins for a young aspirant.

In a country more than a billion strong, however, reaching the top is deceptively, overwhelmingly minute. Passions after a certain age take a backseat when reality stares back with a wicked smile that a lot of young cricketers might want to be ignorantly blissful from. The reality of having to earn a living, the reality of facing rejections, the reality of dreams coming crashing down, the reality where the dream of playing cricket for a living might turn into a nightmare.

Take for instance, Pavan Deshpande, who envisioned a future where cricket would be his living when he left his hometown of Dharwad to test out his luck in Bengaluru at the age of 16 when most of the teenagers in traditional Indian households would be seeing their dreams smothered in favour of engineering, medicine or business degrees as their future.

However, Deshpande’s dreams did not blind him from his reality. Finding the right balance is extremely difficult, but Deshpande seems to have nailed it. In a country where an examination is a gateway to opportunities, one ought to be very brave to turn a blind eye to them. On the 28th of January 2018, Pavan Deshpande would have two reasons to be nervous and excited about. He was about to appear for a bank promotion examination, while not far away his name would be going under the hammer. It would be a day where things could go immaculately well, or his fortunes could plunge south-ways in a matter of hours.

As it turns out, as Deshpande recollects in an interview with Deccan Chronicle, he would come out of the examination hall to find his phone notifications trying hard to cope-up with the 47 missed calls. The dream of playing on the big stage - the prospect of sharing a dressing room with the likes of Virat Kohli and AB De Villiers had come true. “I didn’t know I was picked. After the exam, I saw 47 missed calls! I called my mom and she gave me the news. I feel like I’ve made my parents proud — they’ve worked hard for me,” said Deshpande.

Passion makes us human, it drives us forward, but sunk cost effect can blind us to the practical realities of life. Striking a balance, while not allowing the burden of short-term rejection combined with the everyday necessities, could be near impossible. Deshpande has managed it well. At the age of just under 31, he makes his second attempt at cracking his dream of breaking through to the RCB playing eleven in 2020.

[Deccan Chronicle inputs]