Toronto school gripped by cricket fever
A cricket-crazy Toronto middle school hosts a sleepover during World Cup madness. Hundreds came to watch the final match — and to raise money for a new cricket field of their own.
NOTE: This article has been edited from a previous version.
Of the one billion people watching the World Cup cricket final, none, surely few were more over-the-top excited than the 500 fans whose claps, cheers and chants echoed through a Toronto middle school auditorium.
On Saturday, Valley Park Middle School became a hub of cricket festivities. Students, teachers and community members — some young enough to be carried by fathers, others old enough to have impressive white beards — gathered to watch the final match projected onto a theatre-sized screen.
Shrieks and whistles greeted downed wickets and scored runs for both the Indian and Sri Lankan teams as they faced off in Mumbai. At times, the auditorium rumbled with applause.
The exuberance shouldn’t have been a surprise since the event was dubbed “Toronto’s Biggest Cricket World Cup Party Ever!”
Still, it was impressive to see. Especially with many of the spectators having logged little more than 30 minutes of sleep in the hours leading up to the match.
Valley Park’s all-out cricket party was an all-night affair. The event got going well before the Saturday game, with hundreds arriving Friday evening with plans to spend the night.
The sleepover was organized to raise funds for Valley Park’s proposed school yard revitalization project that includes a cricket pitch and outdoor gathering spaces for the community.
Event organizers hoped bringing the community together for the World Cup final would kick-start support — the financial kind and neighbourly kind.
“People are calling it a fundraiser, but really it’s a friend-raiser,” said Valley Park principal Nick Stefanoff, who grabbed just two hours of sleep before the Saturday cricket match. “The idea was to get excitement in the community about our project . . . When we start looking for sponsors to help pay for the park, they will see the community has been 100 per cent behind it from the beginning.”
Located between Thorncliffe Park and Flemingdon Park, Valley Park is the largest middle school in Canada with 1,200 students, the majority coming from newly immigrated South Asian families who live in the many nearby apartment towers.
The proposed $1.7 million revitalization plan would unfold over Valley Park’s school yard, as well as recently leased adjoining Hydro One corridor lands. In addition to a cricket field, the green space would have a baseball diamond, soccer pitch, an amphitheatre, picnic areas and butterfly and herb gardens.
“Most of the community lives almost exclusively in apartment buildings so green space is at a premium and recreation space is really important,” said school trustee Gerri Gershon (Ward 13, Don Valley West), the first to propose the sleepover fundraiser.
“It’s a great way to bring the community together. It’s what we want our schools to be, hubs of the community and the focus of the community.”
Ali Baig, school council co-chair of the nearby Marc Garneau Collegiate Institute, spent Friday night at Valley Park as a volunteer. Lots of help was needed to distribute food, watch over excited kids and supervise mini-games of cricket and basketball taking place in the school’s gymnasium.
“It was fabulous, so much fun,” Baig said of the sleepover. “We have a lot of confidence that we have the support we need for the project.”
The packed-full Friday night had a line-up that included Bollywood dancing demonstrations, ghost stories, games and a DJ who pumped out three hours of upbeat, dance-friendly music. Few people got any sleep.
But none of that fun compared to the cricket final that got underway at 5 a.m. Saturday.
By the end of the eight-hour match, all the fans, even those cheering for defeated Sri Lanka, whooped, cheered and admitted to a great night out.
“I had no idea if we (India) could do it, but we did,” said Mahabu Shaik, who spent 16 hours at Valley Park with his young son, Masthan.
Both father and son nodded and blearily grinned when asked if they enjoyed the sleepover. Neither planned to go home for a nap.
“There is no time,” Shaik said, “There is a lot of celebration left.”
