DUBAI // The girls of Sharjah's Delhi Private School (DPS) are helping highlight India's aspirations to become a major force in basketball.
They have not lost a game for two years with their latest triumph coming in last week's Skyline Inter-School Sports Festival in Dubai.
"One of the best teams in the entire Middle East who would be good enough to make a living out of the game," Ali Tharammil, their proud coach, said.
He could not even recall all their successes as he guessed they had won "seven or eight" tournaments over the past two years. These days, any basketball team with an Indian background at any level should be treated with respect - and this UAE side has few peers.
The DPS girls comprehensibly defeated Our Own English High School Dubai 31-11 in the Skyline final with star player Julier Johny top scoring with 12 points.
Tharammil, who has a long history in basketball coaching, was delighted but far from surprised by his team's most recent win.
"Basketball is now huge in India. It is the second biggest sport after cricket, which I know comes as a surprise to a lot of people," he said. "The NBA is really popular with young people especially.
"The girls at DPS are excellent and could take on and beat just about every team in the Middle East.
"There is an Indian female player [Geethu Ann Jose] who has played in the Women's Australian Basketball League at a high level and some of our pupils have the potential to be that good. But they won't make a career out of sport. They are talented enough but they would rather concentrate on their studies. We were really pleased that the girls won the Skyline tournament but I expected it because they have been so good for so long.
"We also had the most valuable player, Joannu Ann Varughese, and the most promising player, Shreya Sadhu."
The DPS side hope to travel to India to take part in bigger tournaments and it seems they are going to take some beating. Even if there is bound to be stiff competition.
DPS were the overall winners at the second running of the Skyline Inter-School Sports Festival at the Skyline University College.
The boys and girls won the table tennis titles, to go along with their basketball triumph, in a tournament that featured 16 schools and almost 600 participants.
