How many times have you been frustrated that you were not able to play outdoor games as much as you could during your childhood? It would be a dream come true if you could bring back those glory days, right? Though namma Chennai has a huge fan base for various sports, there is a lack of platforms for coordinating and conducting tournaments when it comes to recreational sports. Right from gathering and creating a team, to finding venues for hosting events, several aspects continue to be huge challenges. However, everything is about to change!
Two exciting online social platforms — Gameday and I am Play — have exciting features that promise to be a boon for sports lovers. These apps will not only help in organising tournaments but will also make semi-recreational sports more competitive. DC talks to the CEOs of the respective companies to get insights on what they are planning to offer.
Gameday:
With the simple concept of creating a social platform through which sports enthusiasts can find like-minded individuals to organise sporting events and tournaments, Gameday, which was founded by Srinath Srinivasan, promises to take recreational sports in the country to the next level.
“There is a serious dearth of sporting venues, not only in Chennai, but in the whole country. Hence, there is no scope for people to engage in semi-recreational sports. Through our company, we hope to rectify this,” says Srinath, who is a graduate from NUS Singapore. He adds, “While world competitions are happening on turf, our competitions are happening on dust bowls, public grounds, beaches, parks, and apartments! But if we enable our kids to use the right sporting infrastructure, and get proper mentorship and guidance, we will definitely create local superstars.”
Though Gameday is still in its nascent stage, it has already conducted 11 tournaments in various sports like cricket, football, badminton, and table tennis. “We have got a good response not only from players, but also from ground owners. It is overwhelming to note that our first tournament had 100 participants, while our last one had as many as 500 participants!” he exclaims. In fact, one of its cricket tournaments, Resonance 1.0, was organised in collaboration with Ravichandran Ashwin’s Gen-Next Cricket Institute. “Ashwin loved our concept and offered his full support. We are grateful that he graced the tournament and it turned out to be a big hit. He even said that he is willing to take part in Resonance 2.0”
One of the unique features of Gameday is that they are also working towards bringing more women participants. A women-only badmintondoubles tournament was conducted to encourage them — “After the age of 14, girls drop out of sports at a rate that is twice that of boys. If we let them access professional infrastructure and guidance, parents become more secure and keen to let their daughters continue and pursue sports professionally.”
I AM PLAY:
Though it is yet to be unveiled, I AM PLAY, with an interesting feature set, is exciting football fans in the city. Sai Sathvik, the CEO of the company, says that the idea evolved to cater to personal needs.
“How many times have we seen football matches getting cancelled just because we couldn’t gather enough people, or due to the lack of a ground? It is frustrating, isn’t it? We hope that our app will unite all football fans in a more organised way,” starts Sathvik on a hopeful note.
With certain features similar to Gameday, I AM PLAY will help individual teams to create tournaments through its app. “Most of the tournaments until now are only discussed over Whatsapp. As a result, many of the planned events don’t even happen as there is no proper coordination. Digitisation is the only way to reduce the haphazard nature of such tournaments. It would also bridge the gap between event and venue coordinators,” he muses. Explaining how the app works, Mathew Jose, the company’s co-founder lists out its unique features – “Once you download the app, you can create your own profile — which will appear like a football trading card. And you will also be able to see other similar profiles as cards. Through this, you can form a group to chat and coordinate tournaments. You will also get the list of venue available and either you can directly call the ground owners to set up the game or we can do that for you. Further, once there are enough people, you can even compete with teams locality wise — for example, you can set a match like Nungambakkam vs Adyar!”
The app’s trailer is expected to be released this month, and Sathvik hopes that it will attract the attention of football fans. “Even before the official trailer launch, the idea of I AM PLAY has been received positively by people. The trailer will increase the anticipation level even more!” he says.
