In this special episode, we chat with veteran sports writer Sharda Ugra.

From interviewing star cricketers as a college student... to blazing a trail as a sports journalist in the early '90s... to writing on a variety of sports for The Hindu... to being the chief sports writer at India Today... to presently working as a senior editor at ESPNcricinfo... Sharda has been an inspiration for a number of sports writers around the world.

We chat with Sharda about her illustrious career – and are riveted by her range of experiences as well as her inexhaustible bank of anecdotes.

Talking Points:

• The magazines that hooked her on to sports
• The interviews she and her college buddies did with the stars of the 1980s
• Memories of Imran Khan
• Landing her first job
• Finding Sachin Tendulkar's number
• Covering sailing 
• Watching Kenya's biggest cricketing moment
• The match-fixing shock
• The fall of Hansie Cronje
• The Azharuddin she interviewed
• Authoring a book with John Wright
• The Ganguly era
• Player access and the importance of stories
• Women's cricket - past, present and future
• And much, much more

Participants:

Sharda Ugra

Siddhartha Vaidyanathan (@sidvee)

Ashoka (@ABVan)

Related:

The stolid buccaneer - Sharda Ugra on Mark Taylor

Hansie-gate - Sharda Ugra's piece on the King Commission hearings

What makes sportsmen go corrupt

Manoj Prabhakar? Love? - on a cricketer Sharda Ugra hated to love

All Indian cricketers should write books like this - Sharda Ugra reviews Sanjay Manjrekar's book

Girls aloud - Sharda Ugra on how TV is redefining TV commentary

Couchtalk with Sharda Ugra - interview with Subash Jayaraman

This is personal - Sharda Ugra's letter to Mumbai post 26/11