Tanveer Ahmed Baig
Lovingly known as “Coach Tanny”
8 December 1946 — 22 April 2019 · aged 72
PIA engineer, first-class fast-medium bowler and the Karachi coach who never cut a boy
Karachi, Pakistan Born in Lyari, Karachi Resting at Mewa Shah Graveyard, KarachiAbout Tanveer
The first time Tanveer Baig bowled at the nets of Karachi's National Stadium he was seventeen, wearing borrowed spikes two sizes too large, and with his second delivery he took the middle stump out of the ground. Born in Lyari in 1946, the son of a railway porter, he had learned the game with a tennis ball wrapped in tape, in lanes where a plank was a bat and a handcart made the stumps.
In 1966 he joined Pakistan International Airlines as an apprentice aircraft engineer and spent forty years in the hangars at Jinnah International Airport, keeping Boeings and Fokkers safe. He also played first-class cricket for the PIA team and for Karachi through the late sixties and seventies, a fast-medium bowler with a slingy action and a hundred and twelve first-class wickets, never quite enough for a Test cap but enough, he said, to be recognised by every rickshaw driver on Tariq Road. When his playing days ended he turned to coaching, running free evening nets for neighbourhood boys on a dusty ground in Nazimabad, with one rule: no boy is ever cut. Several of his players went on to first-class cricket; most became engineers, bankers and shopkeepers who still called him Coach.
He loved nihari on Sunday mornings, listened to Test commentary on a transistor radio he refused to replace, and told the same joke about a camel and a cricket bat at every wedding. He died peacefully at home on 22 April 2019, aged seventy-two, after a long illness treated at the Aga Khan University Hospital, where his daughter works as a physician. He leaves his wife Shahida, his sons Faisal and Adnan, his daughter Dr. Sadia and six grandchildren, who play cricket in the family courtyard with a tape-wrapped tennis ball.
“A boy who is left out learns to stop trying. So nobody gets left out.”
- Faith
- Muslim
- Place of birth
- Lyari, Karachi
- Resting place
- Mewa Shah Graveyard, Karachi
- Passed away
- 22 April 2019, Karachi
Janazah Prayer
Tuesday, 23 April 2019 at 07:00 UTC
Add to calendarLife journey
Apprentice Aircraft Engineer to Senior Engineer
Pakistan International Airlines1966 – 2006 · Karachi
Forty years in the hangars at Jinnah International Airport.
First-class cricketer (fast-medium bowler)
PIA and Karachi cricket teams1967 – 1980 · Karachi
A hundred and twelve first-class wickets with a slingy action.
Married Shahida
1972 · Karachi
A marriage of forty-seven years.
Free evening cricket coaching for boys
Nazimabad ground1982 – 2018 · Karachi
Coached hundreds of boys on a dusty ground and cut none of them.
Player of the Match, Patron's Trophy final
Board of Control for Cricket in Pakistan1974 · Karachi
Took five wickets in the final for PIA.
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Family & connections
Tanveer is survived by
- Shahida Baig· Spouse
- Faisal Baig· Son
- Adnan Baig· Son
- Dr. Sadia Baig· Daughter
- 6 grandchildren· Grandchildren
Tributes & memories
6 people have shared a memory of Tanveer.
Knew Tanveer? Share a memory with the family and everyone who loved them.
Sign in to write a tribute- AM
Former player, now an engineer in Dubai
I was the boy who cried when he dropped a catch. Coach put a hand on my shoulder and said, 'The ball will forgive you. Will you?' I say that to myself every time I fail. I caught the next one.
- SB
Nephew in Houston
Uncle Tanveer taught me to grip a ball in the lanes of Lyari. I was seven; he was fifty and still bowling off-breaks in his slippers. When I made the college team in Texas he made me bowl on speaker phone so he could 'hear the line.' I miss that ridiculous line.
- DA
Colleague of his daughter at Aga Khan University Hospital
Sadia spoke of her father so often that we all felt we knew him. When he was admitted he asked the nurses about their families and tried to bowl them out with a rolled paper ball. Nobody minded when he won.
- JM
PIA colleague, Hangar 4
He signed off every aircraft with the same question: 'Would I put my daughter on this?' Forty years of Boeings, not one shortcut. We joked that his hangar was the only one in PIA where you could eat off the floor. Hangar 4 will not forget him.
- RQ
Former player at the Nazimabad ground, now a bank manager
Coach never cut a boy. Not me with my two left feet, not Naveed who stammered, not anyone. He said every boy deserves one over a week. I became a bank manager; Naveed became an umpire. We both owe him the best parts of ourselves.
- HM
Neighbour in Nazimabad
Every evening at five the children arrived with bats and Tanveer arrived with a bag of oranges. He divided them equally and kept the smallest piece for himself. In forty years I never saw him eat the biggest piece of anything.
