news-engine

On weekend mornings in Vingis Park, Vilnius' largest green space, walkers and joggers sometimes stop to watch something they've never seen before: cricket. It takes a group of men about an hour just to set the pitch up – stretching a mat across the grass and pinning it down – and even then, the uneven ground sends the ball bouncing at odd angles. But for the South Asians who gather here a few times a month, it's worth it. Cricket is one of the world's most widely followed sports, with a particular grip on the Indian subcontinent. The 2025 Champions Trophy final between India and New Zealand drew around 230 million viewers in India alone. In countries like India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, it is less a game than a piece of national identity – something most people grow up playing before they can properly explain the rules. Lithuania, a country of fewer than three million people in northeastern Europe, is not among them. But a small and growing community of South Asian expats is trying to change that. Finding something familiar Taufeeq Shaik moved from India to Lithuania four years ago for work. Shortly after arriving in Vilnius, he found a Facebook group of people playing cricket in the city and went along. "I realised people were playing seriously. That increased my interest – not just to play cricket, but to grow the community, to bring this game to Lithuania," he said. Playing in an open public space means fielding a lot of curious questions. Passers-by stop to ask what's going on, and the players have learned to explain the basics – and sometimes to hand someone a bat and let them try. A few have come back. The rules, admittedly, take some explaining. Cricket evolved in England over four centuries and spread worldwide during the British Empire; today it is sometimes described as a cross between baseball and chess, owing to the tactical complexity that sits beneath its unhurried surface. The basic idea is simple enough: one team bats, scoring runs by hitting the ball and running between two sets of stumps; the other bowls and fields, trying to get the batters out. Matches range from three-hour Twenty20 games to traditional five-day Test matches. A community of 60 Lithuania currently has four cricket clubs: Vilnius Cricket Club, Aquila Cricket Club, Kaunas Cricket Club, and Falcon Cricket Club, with around 60 active players – most of them South Asian expats working or studying in Lithuania. Matches between the Vilnius and Kaunas clubs, players say, carry a competitive edge not unlike the fierce basketball rivalry between Vilnius' Rytas and Kaunas' Žalgiris clubs – though the tension evaporates the moment the game ends. "I'm from one region of India, my teammates are from other regions. When we come together to play, we become like a family. Most of the people I play cricket with here are close friends," said Shaik. The pitch problem The community's biggest obstacle is practical: there are no proper cricket pitches in Lithuania. Professional cricket requires a specially prepared surface, and the makeshift mat laid out in Vingis Park is a poor substitute – audibly so, as the ball skids unpredictably off the uneven ground beneath it. As a result, official competitive matches are usually played across the border in Latvia or Estonia, which both have proper facilities. "The first challenge is the playing surface," Shaik said. "If we want the player base to grow, if we want to host matches against clubs from other countries, this pitch isn't suitable for that." The community has been in contact with the Lithuanian sports ministry, trying to make the case for investment in proper facilities – though cricket remains far enough from the mainstream that progress is slow. "We're happy with what we have for now. But we know it's not enough." ICC-certified coaches and school visits There are grounds for optimism, though. Several Lithuanian schools have begun showing interest in introducing cricket to pupils, and the community has a handful of coaches certified by the International Cricket Council – the sport's global governing body – who are able to visit classrooms and sports lessons. One of them is Vinayagasundaram Subramani, who goes by Vinay, and who has lived in Lithuania for eight years, learning Lithuanian while working in a supermarket. "Cricket has given me so much here. I got my ICC certificate, I can travel to schools to teach children. It's given me friendships I wouldn't otherwise have," he said. When he and his teammates tell curious Lithuanians that they compete in matches representing Lithuania, he says, the reaction is invariably warm. "I've never seen anyone come and shout at us that we're taking their space. That simply doesn't happen here. Lithuanians are very welcoming, very kind. We feel like we belong." What he misses most, playing cricket in a park far from home, is simple: "The only thing missing is friends and family cheering for you from the boundary. That's the only thing. But here we have teammates who support each other. Sometimes we even livestream matches when we travel to play in other European countries."