22 September,2026 08:48 AM IST | Aichi-Nagoya | Amit Shah
Vaibhav Sooryavanshi and Ishan Kishan
[popcorn number="19" desc="No. of teams India have faced in T20Is before today's match vs Japan" class="Default"]
When the Indian men's cricket team take the field on Tuesday at the Sano Club ground in Tokyo for a highly anticipated friendly fixture against Japan, they will be welcomed by a crowd that mostly comprises Biharis.
According to Abhishek Anand, 28, who plays for the Japan national team but has not been picked in the squad for this particular fixture, there's a huge population of IT students from Bihar, like himself, and neighbouring Jharkhand, who are employed with the tech sector here.
"We have plenty of people here from Bihar and Jharkhand, so Vaibhav Sooryavanshi [hails from Bihar] and Ishan Kishan [hails from Jharkhand] will not feel homesick at all. In fact, even local Bihari food like Litti Chokha [a traditional dish made of whole wheat dough balls, litti, stuffed with spiced roasted gram flour, served alongside a smoky vegetable mash, chokha]. We have our own community association here and are ready to make some homemade Litti Chokha for our boys," Anand, an IIT Kanpur engineer, who works for Accenture here, told mid-day on Monday.
Anand's cricketing journey is as unconventional as it is inspiring. Having grown up playing cricket with a soft ball in Bihar, a move to IIT Kanpur saw him transition to serious leather-ball cricket. Upon graduation, Anand moved to Japan for work, but retained his enduring love for cricket, and a major development in 2021, helped. The Japan Cricket Association secured ICC associate status, paving the way for structured, competitive cricket. "I got enrolled in a local club. Within two years, I proved myself and earned the chance to play for Japan's national team. God is kind that I'm maintaining my job as well as my passion simultaneously," added Anand, who made his T20I debut against the Cook Islands in May last year, and has played 18 matches since, scoring 275 runs, with a highest score of 55.
Anand offered tactical insight into local conditions. "While the Sano Club wickets tend to be slower and favour turn, venues like Nagoya offer truer cricketing surfaces with reliable bounce, promising an exciting contest. There have been some suggestions on social media that teams will score 400 to 500 runs in Nagoya, but that's not true," he said.
Speaking about the love for batting prodigy Sooryavanshi and wicketkeeper-batter Kishan, Anand said: "The Indian community will be present in full force in both locations for all games. There is a lot of anticipation for the India vs Pakistan showdown too. Tickets for the final have already been sold out as everyone is expecting to see an India-Pakistan match."
