It is said that there is hardly any place where you would not find a Malayali.
Menon is a Malayali surname that one normally associates with diplomats and bureaucrats in the higher echelons of Indian administrative circles, but now all that is going to change and how.
Menon creates buzz
Indore-born Malayali Nitin Narendra Menon has created a stir of sorts. Come July 6, the 39-year-old will write a new chapter in Indian cricket umpiring by becoming the first Malayali and the second Indian after Srinivas Venkatraghavan to officiate in the iconic Ashes series — in the third Test at Leeds.
He will also officiate in the five-day fourth Test at Manchester, which begins on July 16, and round up his Ashes campaign as the TV umpire for the fifth and final Test at The Oval from July 27-31.
Menon, whose father Narendra Menon has been an international umpire, went a step ahead by being included in the prestigious ICC Elite Panel of Umpires in June 2020.
Influenced by his father now among the elite
Menon, who became the third Indian to get featured in the ICC Elite Panel list after Venkatraghavan and Sundaram Ravi, was the youngest to be inducted into the ICC Elite Panel, a testimony to his fast-growing stature among the best umpires in the world.
Menon has reached the pinnacle of international cricket umpiring, but his first love was to always play the game of cricket. He played two List A matches for Madhya Pradesh in 2004. However, an opportunity to test his umpiring acumen emerged in 2006, and he has never looked back since then.
It was at the nudging of his father that Menon gave a BCCI umpires exam in 2006 and this led to him eventually finding his true calling.
“My father is a former international umpire and in 2006 BCCI conducted an exam for umpires after a gap of almost 10 years. My father told me to take a chance and give the exam, saying, 'If you clear, you can always take up umpiring as a profession'. So I took the test, and in 2006 I became an umpire,” he said.
“My priority was to play for the country rather than umpiring. But I quit playing at 22 and became a senior umpire at the age of 23. It wasn't worth trying to play and umpire, so I decided to focus on umpiring alone,’’ Menon had said in an ICC interview when he was inducted into the ICC Elite Panel of Umpires.
Menon’s merit, which led him to be called for umpiring in the Ashes, can be gauged from the fact that he has officiated in 112 internationals, including Tests, ODIs, men’s T20Is and women’s T20Is.
Originally hailing from a state traditionally known for non-cricketing sporting disciplines such as football, volleyball, and athletics, Menon has been the latest Malayali to make a splash on the Indian cricket radar. From the heydays of S Sreesanth to the recent exploits of Sanju Samson for India and in the IPL, Menon’s development as an absolutely top-notch umpire on the world stage would invariably receive much cheer from all Indians in general and Malayalis in particular.
