From ‘Stories with Saif’ to Bangla Tigers

As days are passing by, the sports industry in Bangladesh is just getting stronger. Not only the mainstream media and TV channels are evolving the scope of promoting and writing about sports but also social media has a huge value now. 

A Facebook page created to pursue the passion for sports has turned into a brand for 25-year old Saif Ahmed Chowdhury. Saif, who is known as “Stories with Saif” on Facebook has over 150k followers, and 3k followers on Twitter. 

He launched his journey just before the start of the 2019 ICC ODI World Cup in Australia & New Zealand. 

When asked the reason behind opening his own personal page, Saif said - “I used to post regularly about cricket and football on my person profile and write a lot of things. But suddenly I realized that everyone in my friend list might not be fan of sports. So, people can get annoyed with my posts all the time. Then I thought of creating my own page for the sports-lovers to follow me and relate to my writings.” 

It took a very little time for Saif to draw attention of a good number of followers in his platform. But his aim was not to gather huge audience, but to maintain a short and quality audience. In this regard, he said – “I always believe in quality over quantity. I’m not a cricket analyst, but a person who tries to interpret the emotions of the fans about this beautiful game. So I love the followers who are in my page.” 

Keeping patience brings fruitful results. And, it did for the passionate sportswriter. Saif had the main breakthrough last year when he got a call-up from Bangla Tigers, who are a franchise team in the Abu Dhabi T10 League in UAE. He got the opportunity to work with them in the 4th & 5th seasons of the tournament. 

It opened the doors for Saif to work alongside the top international cricketers like Mohammad Amir, Faf du Plessis, Andre Fletcher, Shakib Al Hasan and many others like them. He is set to work with Bangla Tigers in this year’s T10 League tournament as well as the Social Media Manager of the side. 

With all his gathered experience, Saif hopes to work in various franchise leagues all over the world in future. He also wants to bring a change in the sports industry in Bangladesh. He, however, doesn’t promise that he can bring a change, but he promises that he will try his level best.