Chapter 114: Camp Rankings
The morning after the internal practice match felt unusually quiet.
No one spoke much during breakfast.
The usual jokes from Danish had disappeared.
Even the ever-calm Aryan ate silently while reading a notebook filled with batting observations.
Every player understood why.
The coaches had spent the previous night reviewing hours of footage, fitness reports, bowling data, batting decisions, and fielding statistics.
Today...
The results would be revealed.
---
The academy auditorium gradually filled with players.
Unlike the practice ground, this room contained no cricket nets or bowling machines.
Only rows of chairs facing a large projector screen.
Coach Rana stood beside it with Coach Kapoor, the fitness trainer, bowling coach Harish, and three HPCA selectors.
A thick folder rested in Coach Rana’s hands.
Nobody looked relaxed.
Thirty-two district champions sat in complete silence.
---
Coach Rana stepped forward.
"You’ve now completed two weeks of the State High Performance Camp."
His calm voice echoed through the hall.
"In those two weeks..."
He lifted the folder.
"...we have collected over three thousand individual performance records."
A ripple of surprise spread through the room.
Three thousand.
Every sprint.
Every throw.
Every batting drill.
Every practice match.
Everything had been measured.
---
Coach Rana continued.
"Today..."
He paused.
"...we’re not announcing the State XI."
Several players unconsciously relaxed.
"This is only an evaluation."
He looked around the room.
"A ranking."
Coach Kapoor took over.
"And rankings..."
He smiled faintly.
"...change every day."
---
The projector came to life.
The HPCA logo slowly faded before the first category appeared.
FASTEST STRIKE RATE
The room immediately became alert.
The list scrolled slowly onto the screen.
1. Arjun Mehra – 168.9
2. Kabir Singh – 163.5
3. Danish Thakur – 161.8
The players applauded politely.
Danish looked around dramatically.
"I’d like to thank—"
Coach Rana interrupted.
"You were also dismissed four times attempting reverse sweeps."
Laughter erupted.
Danish lowered his head.
"I withdraw my speech."
More laughter filled the room.
---
The rankings continued.
Fourth.
Fifth.
Sixth.
Sahil quietly watched.
His name hadn’t appeared.
Not yet.
Finally...
The screen stopped.
9. Sahil Choudhary – 149.6
A small smile appeared on Sahil’s face.
Top ten.
At state level.
Not extraordinary.
But respectable.
Coach Kapoor glanced toward him.
Instead of congratulating him, he simply asked,
"Happy?"
Sahil hesitated.
"A little."
Coach nodded.
"Good."
"Stay only a little."
---
The next category appeared.
POWER HITTING INDEX
Immediately the atmosphere changed.
Everyone instinctively looked toward Sahil.
This was his strength.
The rankings appeared one by one.
3. Sahil Choudhary
A quiet murmur spread through the room.
Coach Harish smiled.
"Distance isn’t everything."
The second name appeared.
2. Kabir Singh
Then...
1. Arjun Mehra
Even Sahil looked surprised.
Coach Rana noticed.
"You expected someone else?"
Sahil nodded honestly.
"I thought I had a chance."
Coach Kapoor smiled.
"You do."
He pressed another button.
The projector displayed another statistic.
---
Maximum Six Distance
Arjun Mehra – 96.4 metres
Sahil Choudhary – 95.1 metres
The difference...
Barely over one metre.
Coach Kapoor folded his arms.
"Power isn’t measured by one shot."
He looked around the room.
"It’s measured by repeating it."
Sahil understood immediately.
He could hit one massive six.
Arjun could hit ten.
That consistency made the difference.
---
The next rankings flashed across the screen.
Throwing Accuracy.
Reaction Speed.
Boundary Fielding.
Slip Catching.
Some players smiled.
Others quietly noted areas for improvement.
No one ranked highly in everything.
Even Arjun had weaknesses.
---
Then...
The fitness coach stepped forward.
"This category..."
He looked around.
"...hurts the most."
The projector changed again.
FITNESS COMBINED SCORE
The ranking included endurance, sprint speed, agility, recovery, and strength.
Names began appearing.
Sahil searched the list.
Not first.
Not fifth.
Not tenth.
Finally...
17. Sahil Choudhary
Exactly the middle.
He wasn’t disappointed.
Not really.
Coach Rana had warned him after the fitness benchmark.
His cricket had improved faster than his body.
The mission remained incomplete.
---
The fitness coach nodded toward him.
"Your endurance improved."
Another page appeared.
"Agility also improved."
Then another.
"But recovery..."
He shook his head.
"...still limits you."
Sahil quietly wrote the observation inside his notebook.
Another weakness.
Another target.
---
The final category before lunch carried a different kind of weight.
Coach Kapoor himself walked toward the projector.
He didn’t smile.
He didn’t speak immediately.
Instead...
He looked directly at every batsman in the room.
"This..."
He paused.
"...is the category that decides careers."
The projector faded to black.
Then new words slowly appeared.
BATTING TECHNIQUE
Silence filled the auditorium.
Even Danish stopped fidgeting.
Technique wasn’t measured by sixes.
Or strike rate.
Or applause.
It was measured by repeatability.
Discipline.
Balance.
Judgment.
The screen began revealing names.
Sahil watched carefully.
His heartbeat quickened.
Where would he stand?
The answer slowly appeared.
Sahil Choudhary
Overall Technical Grade
AVERAGE
The word remained on the screen.
Simple.
Honest.
Impossible to ignore.
No criticism followed.
No explanation.
Only one word.
Average.
Sahil stared at it for several long seconds.
He had entered the state camp believing power would carry him forward.
Now...
The rankings had shown him the truth.
His power belonged among the best.
His technique...
Still belonged among the ordinary.
Coach Kapoor closed the folder in his hands.
Then looked directly at Sahil.
"You finally know..."
A faint smile crossed his face.
"...what separates potential from excellence."
The word remained on the projector.
AVERAGE.
It wasn’t insulting.
It wasn’t encouraging.
It was simply...
Honest.
Sahil kept looking at the screen.
Two weeks earlier, that word might have disappointed him.
Now...
After facing bowlers who swung the ball at nearly 140 km/h, after spending hours repeating the same cover drive hundreds of times, after discovering weakness after weakness...
He accepted it.
Average wasn’t an insult.
It was his starting point.
---
Coach Kapoor stepped away from the projector and stood in front of the players.
"Many of you are looking at your rankings."
His calm voice echoed through the auditorium.
"And you’re making the same mistake."
Several players looked up.
"You think these rankings describe who you are."
He shook his head.
"They don’t."
Another pause.
"They describe who you are..."
"...today."
Silence.
"Tomorrow..."
He smiled faintly.
"...is your responsibility."
---
The projector changed again.
Instead of names, four different categories appeared.
POWER
TECHNIQUE
FITNESS
CRICKET IQ
Coach Kapoor picked up a marker.
"Imagine a player with one hundred out of one hundred power."
He drew a large circle beside it.
"But only fifty technique."
Then another.
"And forty fitness."
Finally...
"Sixty cricket intelligence."
He stepped back.
"Would he survive national cricket?"
Nobody answered.
Coach looked around.
"No."
"Because cricket rewards balance."
He drew four equal circles.
"The complete player always defeats the incomplete specialist."
Those words struck Sahil deeply.
His power was among the best.
But the rest of his game still lagged behind.
---
Coach Rana took over.
"We’ll now discuss individual reports."
One by one...
Players were called to the front.
Each received a printed evaluation.
Strengths.
Weaknesses.
Areas for improvement.
Nobody else’s report was discussed publicly.
Only with the player concerned.
---
"Sahil Choudhary."
He stood immediately.
Walking toward the front somehow felt more difficult than walking to bat.
Coach Rana handed him a blue folder.
"Read."
Sahil opened it carefully.
---
HPCA PLAYER EVALUATION
Name: Sahil Choudhary
District: Kangra
Primary Role: Middle-order Batsman
---
Strengths
• Excellent power generation.
• Fearless under scoreboard pressure.
• Strong acceleration during death overs.
• Positive attitude toward learning.
• Composed temperament.
---
Needs Improvement
• Off-side consistency.
• Reading late swing.
• Fitness endurance.
• Defensive technique.
• Strike rotation against quality spin.
---
Overall Assessment
High Potential
Not Yet Match Ready for State XI
Recommended:
Continue High Performance Training
---
Sahil read every line twice.
He didn’t feel discouraged.
In fact...
The report answered questions he hadn’t even known to ask.
---
Coach Rana folded his arms.
"Questions?"
Sahil looked up.
"Sir..."
"What is the biggest reason I’m not ready?"
Coach Rana didn’t answer immediately.
Instead...
He looked toward Coach Kapoor.
The batting coach smiled.
"You score difficult runs."
Sahil nodded slowly.
"You need to start scoring easy ones."
---
The sentence confused him.
Coach Kapoor continued.
"You can hit a bouncer for six."
"You can finish an innings."
"You can change a match."
Another pause.
"But..."
He pointed toward the evaluation sheet.
"...can you leave thirty consecutive deliveries outside off stump?"
Sahil stayed silent.
"Can you bat two sessions without frustration?"
Another pause.
"Can you make the bowler impatient instead of yourself?"
The questions answered themselves.
---
Coach Kapoor placed a hand lightly on the folder.
"Talent wins moments."
His voice softened.
"Technique wins careers."
---
As Sahil returned to his seat, Danish leaned closer.
"What did yours say?"
Sahil smiled.
"I’m incomplete."
Danish laughed.
"Mine says I play one risky shot every twelve balls."
Kabir joined in.
"Only one?"
The three friends laughed quietly.
Even criticism felt easier when everyone was receiving it.
---
After lunch, the final presentation began.
Coach Harish stepped toward the projector.
"The selectors asked us one question."
He clicked the remote.
A blank page appeared.
"If we had to choose the State XI today..."
Every player unconsciously straightened.
"...how many places would already be decided?"
The room became completely silent.
Coach Harish held up three fingers.
"Three."
Shock spread through the auditorium.
Only three?
Out of eleven?
Coach continued.
"The remaining eight positions..."
He looked around slowly.
"...are completely open."
Hope immediately returned.
Nothing had been decided.
The competition had only begun.
---
Coach Rana stepped forward one final time.
"Forget your rankings."
He looked directly at every player.
"Forget today’s numbers."
He paused.
"The player ranked fifteenth today..."
His eyes drifted briefly toward Sahil.
"...can finish first by the end of camp."
Another pause.
"But only if he trains like he’s ranked thirtieth."
---
The meeting finally ended.
Players slowly walked back toward the practice ground.
Some discussed their reports.
Others walked alone, deep in thought.
No one seemed satisfied.
And perhaps...
That was exactly what the coaches wanted.
---
Sahil stopped near the empty practice nets.
He opened his blue folder once more.
His eyes returned to the same sentence.
High Potential
Not Yet Match Ready
He smiled.
A month earlier...
Those words might have hurt.
Today...
They motivated him.
Because they proved something important.
He wasn’t being rejected.
He was being prepared.
---
A familiar blue light appeared before his eyes.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
SYSTEM UPDATE
Camp Evaluation Synced
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Current Rankings
Power Hitting: Top 3 ✓
Strike Rate: Top 10 ✓
Fitness: Middle Rank
Technique: Average
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
MAIN OBJECTIVE UPDATED
Become a Permanent Member of the Himachal Pradesh State XI
Progress:
22%
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
NEW SUB-MISSION
Raise Technical Grade
Average ➜ Above Average
Reward:
Technique +5
Hidden Bonus Available
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
The screen slowly faded.
Sahil closed the report and looked toward the main stadium, where players had already begun another evening practice session.
The rankings didn’t make him proud.
They didn’t make him ashamed.
They gave him something far more valuable.
A map.
For the first time since arriving at the Himachal State Camp...
He knew exactly where he stood.
And exactly how far he still had to climb.
He tightened the grip on his bat.
Tomorrow...
The climb would begin again.
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