Willow fever grips Rourkela

ROURKELA: Owners of different teams for Orissa Premier League are going the whole hog to showcase their team and boost the morale of the players. Road shows and inclusion of brand ambassadors are to name a few. More so, after the tourney started at the Barabati stadium in Cuttack on Sunday.
The Western Samurai Rourkela, the only team from western Orissa, organized a road show in which players, brand ambassadors and well-wishers participated.They will meet the Puri Emperors at Vir Surendra Sai stadium, Sambalpur, on Tuesday. The five-km-long road show started at Bisra Chowk and ended near Hotel Mayfair and attracted thousands of people.
The Western Samurai Rourkela has members from across the region.
"The majority of our players bought through auction like Natraj Behera, Preetam Jit Das and Ashok Barik are from Rourkela. Our team also has players from different districts of western Orissa like Sambalpur, Sundargarh, Jharsuguda and Deogarh," Sudhansu Jena, an owner of the Western Samurai Rourkela team, said.
"We are getting very good support from different parts of western Orissa through our website, We have received thousands of messages from our well-wishers," Jena added.
Natraj Behera, the aggressive opening batsman of Orissa, who is the captain is quite optimistic about the team. "We have a balanced side. We have strong bowlers as well as good batsmen and are quite confident about giving our best in this first edition of OPL," said Natraj Behera.
The team has two brand ambassadors, ace playback singer of western Orissa Jitendra Haripal and Swapna Pati, the Rourkela girl, who has bagged an opportunity to act in a Hollywood film. Both are moving with the team members and motivating the players to play their best shots. Swapna appeared quite excited and confident.
"I am very happy to be the brand ambassador because I am a Rourkela girl," Pati said. "I am with the team even during the practice session and trying to play a motivator`s role," she said. "I will continue to do so till the end of this tournament with an aim to see our team as the champions," Swapna said.