It's always been all about sports for Sarthak Sidharth. Since the time he was in Class VII he has played tennis and he quickly graduated to playing national tournaments, representing the state of Maharashtra in 2011. "By 2016, I was in the mid-rankings and did not have the kind of backing and support that I needed to climb on to a better rank," says the former tennis player. But still brimming with passion, connections and ample knowledge of playing sports professionally, the 26-year-old decided to channelise it in other ways — podcasts and entrepreneurship.
All About The Game started in April 2020 and they are going strong ever since. Need evidence? They are currently on Season 5! "I try to have conversations with gold-winning Olympians, sports psychologists, experts and many others to talk about what is required to make it. It's all about creating the right noise," says Sarthak.
It started with Bengaluru-based former tennis player Abraar Nawaz, who was their first-ever guest speaker. In this way, Sarthak approached all those from his circle first to spark invigorating conversations around sports and what it's like on the inside. But the USP of the podcast is not just the plethora of athletes who feature as guests, there are many other perspectives one can learn from.
.png?w=640&auto=format%2Ccompress)
Take the episode with the CEO of Brampton Wolves (a cricket team from Canada), Gurbaksh Singh and how he works at the grassroots level. Or the recent episode with Jan Mühlfeit, Czech manager, coach, mentor and the former chairman of Microsoft Europe who spoke about unlocking human potential in sports and business. So it's not just the ringside view that is important, gaining all perspectives is what gives one a thorough knowledge of the field. "There is something I have taken away from every conversation that I have hosted," says Sarthak.
In this way, Sarthak, who pursued his MBA from Narsee Monjee Institute of Management Studies (NMIMS), not only recorded over 95 episodes, he is now closing in on the century mark. He has assembled a formidable team, who help him bring even more awesome guests on to the podcats. "Every podcast offers nuggets of information on sports in India from different stakeholders," says the youngster. When we point out that they are nearing a century, he says, "Reaching the 100th episode wasn't our target, we stopped looking at numbers like that. What we do want to be is the number one sports podcast in the world and we strongly believe that collaboration is the key to that," shares Sarthak who is pursuing a Professional Diploma in Sports Communication remotely.
The athlete is a lone fighter on the field, but behind them, making them stronger and better every step of the way, is not just a coach but a team of nutritionists, fitness experts, yoga experts and more. "I wanted to level the playing field, provide access to all those who are yet to avail the expertise of these experts, doing which will help them better their game," says the youngster who is based out of Pune. That's how MieSport Global was started in 2017. Using his own network, he brought on board several experts and using software like Zoom, they would connect with budding players and offer mentoring, counselling and other services. They even started organising sports events to keep the spirit up and deepen the connection within the sporting community.
