Ice hockey is Canada‘s premier sport. In Quebec it is often seen as more than that. A cultural identity. Shreyas Movva indulges it in as much as he spends a lot of time wearing a helmet and pads, only instead of standing in front of goal he stands in behind the wickets.”For us, the summer starts from May and ends by September or October. If you’re lucky, you can play [cricket] till the last week of October,” Movva said at his press conference on the eve of Canada’s group-stage game against New Zealand in Chennai. “After that it’s just [winter]. We go indoors, we just practice in the nets, there’s no sides, it’s not match situations, we can’t create that match situation thing.

“Coming from Quebec was not easy for me. I had to perform a lot to get into a national team. Regarding the cricket in Quebec, it is good. It’s just that the grounds are not up to required international level or Associate level. We still need a turf wicket back there. We just play on matting wickets.”

All of these challenges have not stopped Movva from pursuing his dream to play international cricket. At the Associate level, he’s known for his sharp glovework behind the stumps and nifty footwork in front of it. He has played 24 ODIs and 26 T20Is for Canada so far and in the Global T20 Canada, he once took on the express pace of Australia left-arm quick Spencer Johnson.

The 32-year-old has got starts in this T20 World Cup, but is yet to convert them into substantial scores. He now has only two more chances to showcase his skills on the global stage – against New Zealand on February 17 and Afghanistan on February 19 – before he and Canada will recede into the background like most other Associates.

“We get this opportunity [at a World Cup] every two years once, we are not regularly playing against the best teams,” Movva said. “So if you are experienced enough, then you can cope up with this. But it is very hard for an Associate team to go through this process again and again.”

Born in Davanagere, which is located around 260 kilometres away from Bengaluru, Movva had a burning desire to play for the Karnataka state team. Movva represented Tumkur Zone Under-23s back in 2015 and came up against the likes of finisher Abhinar Manohar and legspinner Praveen Dubey, who went onto represent Karnataka and then broke into the IPL.

Movva’s Karnataka dream, though, didn’t come to pass and that’s when he instead decided to fulfill his mother’s dream. He moved to Canada for his studies in 2016.

“I played for zonal and probables in Karnataka and then in the meantime I was thinking that education is one other part I can complete. It’s my mom’s dream,” Movva said. “She has done a triple degree in my house (laughs). So she motivated me. She used to tell me where there is a will, there is a way.

“I was not good at studies – I just wanted to do it for her. And then in that one-year break, I gave my English exams and applied for universities and then I got accepted for Concordia University.”

Movva refused to let go of cricket. He finally realised his dream in 2021 when he became the first Quebec-based player to play international cricket for Canada since 2009.

For most of his career, he has had to split his time between cricket and his IT job, but he isn’t complaining. “My company was allowing me to go and play, [and] also work in the night,” Movva said. “During 2023 – 2024 [when] I used to sit [out of the team] a lot, the job helped me a lot coming out of that. Otherwise, I would have thought ‘why I’m not playing’ and that mindset is horrible for a player, but my job helped me to not to concentrate on that. There is the part of life where you can concentrate.

“I would love to keep doing a software job and also this cricket is my passion. Definitely, I would love to do both and after the World Cup.”

For the moment, he’s eager to test himself against New Zealand in Chennai, a venue where Canada had run Italy close during the warm-ups.

“Yes, definitely I’m happy to come back to Chennai and in one week I can see the difference with the weather also,” Movva said. “Last week when we were here it was a little bit cooler, but now it’s getting hot and we just need to cope up with that and just play the game [against New Zealand].”