Five years ago Sean Hooper took a call at his cricket shop in St Austell from a coach at Rajasthan Royals with an unexpected proposal. Would he be interested in running a Royals academy in Cornwall? “It took me around a nanosecond to say yes,” Hooper says. And sure enough, after a pandemic-related delay, the scheme launched in January 2022.
The Royals set up their first academy outside India at Reed’s School in Surrey in 2019, becoming the first IPL franchise to open an academy abroad. More have followed, including in Dubai and, last month, New Jersey — but the one at Truro School in Cornwall is a particularly striking location because the county is one of the poorest regions of the UK, its population is small and there is little tradition of professional cricket there.
Cornish cricket has never held first-class status and only two Cornwall-born cricketers have played Tests for England: Jack Crapp of Gloucestershire in the 1940s and Surrey’s Jack Richards in the 1980s. The Devon-born Jake Libby, the Worcestershire opener and one of the most consistent championship batsmen in recent years, did develop his game in Cornwall under Hooper’s watchful eye.
There is a perception, which is not entirely inaccurate, that IPL franchises are hard-headed businesses set on planting their commercial flags across the globe — hence the Royals’ stakes in the Caribbean Premier League (with Barbados Royals) and the SA20 (Paarl Royals).
But with Rajasthan and their UK-based lead owner Manoj Badale, there has long been a passion to nurture the sport’s grassroots, a culture that dates back to them winning the first IPL in 2008 under Shane Warne with a young team of relative unknowns.
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“Our academy development strategy is an important route to connecting with the next generation of cricket fans,” Badale once said. “We want to develop a new curriculum of cricket coaching and ultimately contribute to a new philosophy of how the game is played.”
Hooper, who had established links with Rajasthan through taking groups of teenagers to Mumbai with his Cornish Cricket Company, said it was this enlightened outlook that convinced him to take up the offer.
“The point of difference for me is that they’re trying to change peoples’ lives,” he says. “Cornwall is a very minor [cricketing] county. We impact on people as best we can through the values we get through cricket and I felt the Royals were trying to do that. I genuinely believe Manoj is trying to do that. ‘Trying to play the Royals way’ is the mantra.
“They’ve got some forward-thinking people such as Kumar Sangakkara [the former Sri Lanka captain, now head coach at the Royals] and Zubin Bharucha [head of high performance].
“We already had a relatively successful programme to develop young players. We discussed what we did and the Royals said, ‘You don’t really need us, do you?’ I said, ‘Not really, but I want you because the association with something bigger and better than Cornwall is something we need as inspiration.’ It gave our children some stardust.”
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The stardust arrived in the summer of 2022 in the shape of Yashasvi Jaiswal, who was not then quite the superstar he has since become but had, only a few weeks before, opened the batting alongside Jos Buttler in an IPL final. He is one of several young Indian cricketers the Royals have sent Hooper’s way and while he was on his visit he did a hitting session with a group of female youngsters that made the local TV news.
“I’ve taken players for them [the Royals] to clubs in Cornwall and developed them as more rounded human beings,” Hooper says. “When they come to Cornwall they have to be able to survive. Jaiswal has come and spent time with me and I’m still in regular contact with him. He is looking to visit again this summer. He can just escape here, walk the streets without anyone knowing he’s a world-class cricketer.”
The classes Hooper oversees now include a “Jaiswal Juniors” hardball development group and a “Sanju Softball” group, named after Sanju Samson, the Royals captain.
Every quarter, Hooper identifies in each of his age groups those that have shown promise and who he may recommend to be sent to the Royals training academy in Jaipur. He is also looking to take a group of 30 to the academy next year at a subsidised rate. The Royals do not directly fund the Cornwall academy but assist in many ways, and the benefits are plain.
“We have to sustain ourselves,” Hooper, who previously coached at Truro College and ran the Cornwall Cricket Board, adds. “We get a fantastic IT system which they’ve developed — it’s as good as I’ve seen in terms of people development — which allows us to give fantastic feedback to players and coaches.
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“Steffan Jones [a former Royals fast-bowling coach] came and gave us two masterclasses. We’d like more classes but have to be realistic about who can get here and when.
“We don’t make money but it is really healthy. I love it and the children get a great experience, but it is an affordability thing. If a child can’t afford it, they can’t afford it, and Cornwall is fairly high on the index of mass deprivation.
“Everything we do is self-funded. The Cornwall board is funded through the ECB, [the charities] Chance to Shine and the Lord’s Taverners, but county boards are tied to what they have to deliver — much of it is prescribed and data-driven. We’re just trying to help children get better and have fun.” The academy has about 100 regular students but another 200 attend through holiday camps.
The Royals academy at Reed’s School grew out of the Star Cricket Academy run by Sid Lahiri, whose rise to assistant batting coach with Rajasthan’s IPL side exemplifies the Royals approach: Lahiri never played professionally himself but has earned a frontline role with one of the leading teams in India because he adheres to the principles the Royals espouse. Ollie Pope benefited from Lahiri’s academy, as did Phil Salt and Shoaib Bashir.
“In the next two or three years we will see [Royals] academy players appearing in T20 leagues around the world, maybe even in the IPL,” Lahiri predicted.
