Wisden India is back in another avatar – editor Manoj Narayan on what it was, and what it can be, in rapidly changing times.

Wisden India, back in the early-to-mid-2010s, was a delightful place to learn the trade. In fact, the clichés that we were told not to let leak into our copies did a good job of describing the place: there was a good mix of youth and experience, we knew there was always room for improvement, and we all made it a point to take it one story at a time.

I spent half the last decade at Wisden India, during the course of which plenty of values were impressed upon us, from the importance of sticking to facts to leaving behind the feelings of a fan. There was one particular thrashing I received from the chief, on a team-wide email mind you, after filing a story without verifying the claims of an enthusiastic interviewee – suffice to say that embarrassment stopped me from ever repeating that error.

As with all great teams, things petered out, and midway through 2018, Wisden India shut shop, and it seemed that was that. But, much like Indian cricket over the last decade, we’re set for a revival.

The new Wisden India comes with the same zeal to tell stories that cater to all sorts of cricket fans – and that is quite something, given the nature of the cricket fan has changed drastically within just the last decade. We will be housed at Wisden.com, with a specific Indian edition that will keep a keen eye on stories of specific interest to fans in cricket’s most populous country. Rest assured, the rest of the sub-continent, and indeed the world, can count on us for tales suited to your taste.

Wisden in India has always made it a point to enhance the understanding of domestic cricket as well as women’s cricket and youth cricket, at a time when not everyone gave these stories the treatment it deserved. The Wisden India Almanack, guided by Suresh Menon, even extended that attention to detail to junior and school cricket. It’s a tradition we will continue to uphold. And, needless to say, we’ll bring our long-approved brand of analysis and no-nonsense story-telling to the biggest stories of our times [of course, we’ll relax the no-nonsense rule when it comes to banter].

These are strange times indeed, especially when it comes to journalism. The nature of news is evolving. It is all happening digitally, and the difference between real and fake has become increasingly hard to separate. At Wisden India, we’ve made it a point to ensure the values of old-school journalism, which Wisden has always held proudly aloft, will be married with new-age urgency, even if that has to do with Yuzvendra Chahal’s latest TikTok clip.

We will be a hub for everything cricket, be it chasing the authorities on the key issues of the game, highlighting the human elements of the sport, analysing why Virat Kohli hit one through the covers, or simply keeping you up to date on what he and his team are up to on Instagram. We’re taking Wisden into the future, and if you think we’re old suits struggling with touchscreen-laptops, perish the thought!

We’re a young team completely and utterly in love with the sport, with our digital ears extended everywhere to ensure we have an in on every cricket conversation happening out there, especially if it is India-centric. Our colleagues on the London desk will chip in when needed, and provide the all-important outsider perspective.

Apart from yours truly, another of the old guard remains part of the team in this new avatar – Karunya Keshav has been one of the leading voices in the media over the last few years, particularly on women’s cricket, and she’ll be sure to bring that expertise to the fore in these pages – while Akshay Gopalakrishnan, Aadya Sharma and Roshan Gede bring boundless enthusiasm for everything surrounding the sport.

On a personal note, I must mention one of my first colleagues at the old Wisden India, Sidhanta Patnaik. His passion for cricket was infectious, and his work ethic legendary. He is, sadly, no more, and as much as he is missed by me and the industry as a whole, I know that Wisden India bouncing back would have delighted him.

We hope it delights you too. We didn’t originally intend to launch ourselves when the world has its hands full dealing with a pandemic. But rest assured, we’ll be a suitable distraction in these troubling times. And boy, do we need it.