Cricket for the Crocodile

by Ruskin Bond

Ranji's team finds an unexpected opponent—a nosy crocodile—when they play a cricket match against the village boys. Annoyed at the swarms of boys crowding the riverbank and the alarming cricket balls plopping around his place of rest, Nakoo the crocodile decides to take his revenge.

Genres: Short Stories, Childrens

338 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1986

About the author

Ruskin Bond is an Indian author of British descent. He is considered to be an icon among Indian writers and children's authors and a top novelist. He wrote his first novel, The Room on the Roof, when he was seventeen which won John Llewellyn Rhys Memorial Prize in 1957. Since then he has written several novellas, over 500 short stories, as well as various essays and poems, all of which have established him as one of the best-loved and most admired chroniclers of contemporary India. In 1992 he received the Sahitya Akademi award for English writing, for his short stories collection, "Our Trees Still Grow in Dehra", by the Sahitya Akademi, India's National Academy of Letters in India. He was awarded the Padma Shri in 1999 for contributions to children's literature. He now lives with his adopted family in Landour near Mussoorie.

Reviews

[Vaibhav · Rating 5 out of 5]

This short, beautifully illustrated tale, Cricket for the crocodiles, is filled with love for cricket and a sneaky crocodile always fishing its way up the pitch to disturb the game. The tale depicts a fun fight for both the parties trying to get rid of each other on the playing field.
India is so much passionate about cricket and everyone loves to hear a tale involving their favorite sport.

The tale combines the village boys making up a team, with Ranji as their leader to win a friendly match on Sunday as against their neighboring village team. But this match is invaded by and created a ruckus by neighboring spectator, Nakoo – the crocodile who living in a pond nearby always having eyes on the juicy bank manager.

With cricket balls chewed by crocodiles, cricket matches on Sundays, grown ups tumbling to stay on the field, this short story, makes up for a cheerful read.

It makes me remember my match days in our society playground and what sort of nuisance we created on weekend mornings while we were on the field. A sweet fun filled tale, yet another by Ruskin Bond who never fails to amazes us by his sense of humor.

[Atharva Palsule · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ruskin Bond is a good writer. The book is good and little funny.

[Angel Khandpura · Rating 5 out of 5]

Cricket for the Crocodile by Ruskin Bond is an interesting read for children as well as adults. It gave us a sneak-peak into the lives of village and city boys who loved to play cricket in the park near the river bank. There dwells a lazy crocodile who would get disturbed when the boys played cricket. This is a hilarious story on how the boys and the crocodile played against each other. This story leaves us with a message that we need to respect each others place and try to stay in harmony.
We all loved reading this book. Thank you Ruskin Bond for gifting us an incredible book.

With gratitude...
Angel
Vidhi
Faliksha
Ishaan
Team Peek-a-book

[Bani Kaur · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is my first book i read, and i enjoyed it a lot!! There was a funny character called NAKOO and loved the sweet rivalry between Nakoo and team of children. The story kept me attached till the end. I also loved the end of the story.. again that was funny. Overall the book had interesting scenes and good illustrations which helped me to maintain my interest throughout. I liked it !!!

Book reviewed by: Bani Kaur Dhoad. Age = 8 years

[Gaurav · Rating 5 out of 5]

The book, Cricket For The Crocodile is one of the beautiful tales of Ruskin Bond. It is very interesting and hilarious. He is a very famous author around the world. He lives Masoorie and he is 86 years old!
I would give this book million stars. It is about a very lazy crocodile who dwells where Ranji and his teammates play. But the worse thing was that his exams were fortnight away!


Book Reviewed by Arav Bhasin. I am 8 years old and I also love to play cricket.

[Omkar Joshi · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book, less than 50 pages, is a loveable read. Innocence and light humor is sprinkled throughout the book which relaxes the reader, one may even get nostalgic. It lacks the typical Bond charm but that's fine. The central character (Ranji), the crocodile's personality and the villagers leave an impression.
A good pocket read :)

[Ashu · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed reading this story by Ruskin Bond. I had fun while reading because the opponent is not the human being but an animal and that too a crocodile. My favourite part was when the final match started as I was eagerly waiting if Nakoo in anyway could disturb the match or it was smooth. It was a good book.

Thank you
Vedant - 8years old

[Tayen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Cricket for the crocodile is a nice book for people who like fiction. Ruskin Bond hade made it pretty easy to understand. It's about a boy named Ranji who has exams just a fortnight away but he still wants to play a cricket match with his most fearsome rivals- The Village Boys. But. Who won? What happens to the dreaded crocodile named Nackoo ji Read this awesome book to know more!

[Arshiya Gupta · Rating 5 out of 5]

there was a boy and he loved cricket so he gon to played but there was a crocodile none as nakoo and he disturbs the boys then they had a sweet rivalry and one day he stop disterbing them by arshiya gupta my age is 7 in 2020

[Abhy Sunny · Rating 4 out of 5]

Easy and quick read. Ruskin Bond is my hope, to complete reading challenge for this year.

[Rachita · Rating 5 out of 5]

Cricket for Crocodile is something we have never seen..But Ruskin Bond's writing made it even more fun and interesting to read the book.

[Aruna Kumar Gadepalli · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting story for the young readers.

[Mohammad Sabbir Shaikh · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just reread the story that introduced me to the world of Ruskin Bond. It was this children story that made me a Ruskin Bond fan for life.

[Bidisha Sarkar · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great read and delightful humour

[Varsha Seshan · Rating 4 out of 5]

https://www.varshaseshan.com/cricket-...

[Nandini Dubey]

j

[Avinash · Rating 3 out of 5]

I need to read it but I don't know-how

[Saranya Dhandapani · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this book right after receiving the copy. Because I love children's books a lot. I still read the Magazines and Comic books which I read when I was a child. The immense pleasure of diving into that world, leaving everything behind is my happy escape from reality.

Do you remember street crickets and the rules those kids set? Also, have you noticed sometimes the rules changes from street to street? And how the competition gets tougher when it is a weekend match between two street teams or two teams from the same area? Well, if you are able to connect to any part of what I've mentioned above, you'll love this book.

It's a cute story where a group of kids and few adults play a cricket match against each other. And in the meantime, they have found quite interesting and annoying opponent-a nosy crocodile,his name is Nakoo. What did Nakoo do in the Match? Did he interrupt them while playing? Did they punish Nakoo? That's all the story is about and the illustrated edition added more colors to the story.

I had fun while reading this beautiful tale. This brought me so many nostalgia. The streets where the kids used to play Cricket and so many other games now looks empty. Every kid got a mobile now. They might not realise what they are missing until then become an adult or when they read a book like this.

Thank you, Ruskin bond!
Whether it's a children's book or a poem or a novel or a story, I'll always have something to cherish from his writing. That's Ruskin Bond for me :)

[Sarthak Agrawal · Rating 5 out of 5]

it was very funny because it was about cricket and crocodile chewed a cricket ball.

[Fatema · Rating 3 out of 5]

its nice smthing unexpected .....

[BHAVANA BANNU · Rating 5 out of 5]

HILARIOUS :) HAHAHA

[Soumil Kapoor · Rating 5 out of 5]

good

[Varun]

it's awaesome

[Manjistha · Rating 3 out of 5]

A humerous story.Climax was quite unexpected and funny.

[Kshitij Meshram]

Thanks

[Vidya Satish]

not coming