The point of contention: Number 3

Miracles do happen in cricket. But as fans it is so tough to be on the right side of a miracle. Sadly, Indian cricket fans have found themselves on the other side time and again in the last one year- once in South Africa, once in New Zealand and once in Australia, and now in Sri Lanka where the match had slipped right from the hands of Indian team. Bad luck boys. Bad luck

Forget the results, while they do matter, they are not everything, because in the last one year, Indian team has played some really good cricket with some great batting displays and bowling spells by GenX. We just lacked the killer punch more often than not but it is not something to worry about just yet. It will develop. Give the same bunch of players some time and it will.

But quietly, unnoticed by many, there is something else that is slipping away from Indian cricket fans. It is Pujara of course. Life doesn’t give you two Rahul Dravids in succession, but when it does, just don’t do what Indian cricket team management is doing right now. Pujara is The Wall of a new era. Be it the temperament, the solid technique or the saint-like calmness itself, he is what every Indian could only have ever dreamed of after Rahul Dravid announced his retirement.

Before the start of Sri Lanka tour, Virat Kholi justified his preference of Rohit Sharma over Pujara by stating that he needs someone who would counter attack and score freely at the top (as if we did not have Dhawan or Kholi himself for that matter and also as if every great test team had a counter attacking number 3 batsmen. Funny) and also that Rohit deserves a chance at number 3. Sure, we backed Dhoni for his choices, preference for his players, but Dhoni always came up with rationale reasoning over his decisions. Kholi’s argument though has no buyers.

While Kholi can back his instincts and give chances to players but the larger question remains is at what cost? Pujara for that matter did not perform so poorly that it would have warranted that he be dropped from the team. In the three test series against SA, Eng and Aus, Pujara averaged 70, 22 and 33.33 respectively, stacking up numbers that weren’t too bad. And in the same period Rohit has 11.25, 17.00 and 28.33 against SA, Eng and Aus. And while Pujara had 1 test hundred and 3 fifties, Rohit has 1 fifty in that period.

Number 3 position is about more than just scoring big hundreds here and there, it is about seeing off fiery spells from Steyn, swinging bullets from Starc or table top turners of a day 5 pitch. But if the number 3 fails in that phase, it exposes off the middle order a bit too soon to the wrath of oncoming fire from bowlers who are on top spells.

Rohit Sharma, the eternal talented star of Indian cricket, has some scintillating ODI knocks but he never displayed the solid technique that would have instilled a belief in the fans that he could see through spells from Steyn or Starc on tough days. On the other hand, Pujara had already proven himself in series against SA and also in Australia briefly where even though he didn’t score heavily he did all the hard work and saw off the tough opening phases but unfortunately got out to soft dismissals. There was no way he could have been dropped after a not-so-bad first three tests against Australia. But dropped he was on the first day Kholi took up full time captaincy.  

It is still very early into Kholi’s Test captaincy era, but we are already getting what the looks have promised: Arrogance and brashness. It is one thing to be aggressive but it is something else to expect every batsman of the team to be a replica of the captain, the aggression. What if Pujara isn’t aggressive? Does he have to be? To play in the Indian team? Was Dravid aggressive? Did Sourav Ganguly drop Rahul Dravid for a Yuvraj Singh? Nope. It’s still early to comment, but these are disturbing signs as far as captaincy is concerned.

It’s good that we lost the first test in such a shocking turnaround. It gave me the opportunity to pout and cry about Pujara, because if we had won, Kholi would probably have been right and me and legions of other cricket enthusiasts wrong if we brought up the Pujara topic. Kholi had already said that he would give an extended run to Rohit Sharma to prove himself at number 3, because he believes if Rohit gets going there is hardly anything that could stop him. But test cricket isn’t about that one knock on a flat track, it is about much more. 

Forget Rohit, it is not about Rohit. It is about Pujara. Does he deserve to sit out on the bench match after match? Was he that bad before he got dropped?
Look up the stats: He was not. 

  

  

A defeat, a reaction and a champion

Indians looked like they were more bothered with International Yoga Day than anything else on the morning of 21^st June, but in fact, lot of us were more anxious on how eleven of our boys would flex their muscles across on the eastern border of Bengal in the second odi. We comforted ourselves with the words “Come on! We couldn’t lose an ODI series to Bangladesh for God’s sake. Chill!” and went about our day’s activities. But 35 overs into 1^st innings, all of us knew.

Most of us, after the defeat, might have played it down with “Well, we played non stop from last 16 months” or “Yeah, it’s a sport! Happens” or “yeah whatever, I am not that much into cricket now”,  but the truth was that we all switched off our TV sets, did not carry on our duty of checking out on the world by logging into facebook, and crept under our bed sheets, snuggled close to ourselves, and cried (Over exaggeration obviously).

On the face of it, a night’s sleep would have sufficed for most of us ardent fans. And it was. True Indian cricket fans are already over the defeat. Time to move on. Bangladesh bowled and batted better than us and we simply met the inevitable result of defeat. What if it was to Bangladesh? They are a side that is improving and it would do cricket a world of good if the number of good competitive teams are increasing.

But what bothered true Indian cricket fans, was the reaction of media and their deep rooted tradition of quoting without context. The headlines “Dhoni offers to quit captaincy” lay bombarded in my newsfeed and notifications in my phone. To shed some light onto the context, what Dhoni exactly said was in response to the questions of two “journalists” who questioned him if he thought he was still the right man to lead Indian cricket team, and one of them went as far as to question Dhoni if he thought himself as the reason behind the mess that Indian cricket is in (wait, first of all, what mess?), and when you take the journalists words and the following reply from Dhoni into picture, you will understand that what Dhoni said was more of a hit back at critics (as rightly headlined by espncricinfo, the only sensible media house in the country that is worth following as far as cricket goes)

Dhoni’s reply:

"I am really enjoying my cricket, I know this question was coming. I know the media really loves me. Yes, if it is a justifiable thing that if you remove me and the Indian cricket will start doing really well, and if I am the reason for all the bad that is happening to Indian cricket, definitely I would love to step away and play as a player. Ultimately you want India to win. It doesn't matter who is the captain”

"I was never really in line to become a captain. It was a job or responsibility for me. I have taken that responsibility. If they want to take it away, I am happy to give it away”

Now for a second, think about the stupidity behind the scribes question and how Dhoni replied, and also about how foolishly Indian media quoted it out of context. #JustThingsIndianMediaDoes should be a trend every time they pull up such stuff, so that we as people could alienate our identity from theirs so that we Indian people itself are not scathingly looked at as immature as our media. Indian cricket fans are mature and composed enough to handle defeat to a former “minnow”, but certainly that’s not the picture that is being painted to the world.  

Dhoni was never as classy as a Dravid, as elegant and wristy as a Laxman, as talented as a Rohit, and as compact as a Sachin, but he has made it thus far with his awkward, unorthodox batting techniques. His value lies not just in the runs he contributed but the way he ran things in Indian cricket for the last 7 years without any scandalous episodes and controversies that were a routine to break out in the previous eras of captains. Being the captain of Indian cricket team is not just about the decisions taken on field but also about everything else outside, and Dhoni was a master at it. He cut down potential controversial questions with sarcastic comments filled with humor, gave lesser opportunities to be misquoted and defended and backed his players in front of press. The true value of Dhoni’s presence would be realized only when the sun would have set on his career.

I believe Dhoni’s skill set would someday be recognized as a case study to understand emotional intelligence with regard to leading a team, any team. When you see Dhoni leading a fielding side at a crunch situation with the batting team, say, require 20 runs in 18 balls on a flat wicket, it is not that he is not tensed, it is just that he has the immense EI ability to mask it, separate the emotions from his thinking capacities and then take decisions.

And the pinnacle of the achievement of his emotional intelligence skills can be traced to the recent success of Dhawan in the world cup. He backs and backs a player, drops them, gives them time and then picks them up, believes in them and they deliver. And this is possible only when a captain is able to understand his team emotionally, individually and work on it accordingly. It is no fluke that we have had tremendous success in ICC tournaments in the last few years because it was his ability to handle immensely talented players and make them perform at the highest level.

I may sound like a die hard MSD fan, but the truth is that, I absolutely am not. I am an admirer of Dhoni for his certain skill sets. I have been a neutral observer of Dhoni. My neutrality is true to the day and it was never affected by developments such as dropping of some of my favourite senior players like Yuvi, Sehwag or Zaheer, nor has it swung to the positive side with those big sixes that he hits.

There are allegations against him off the field. They might be true. They might not. I will never take controversial things on their face value as reported in media. Even if they are true, I will remember Dhoni for the man he was in front of the camera, on the field and off it, and in his own way he was the classiest, most compact and elegant player of them all.

PS: I am just sometimes sad that fewer people recognize him and give due credit for what he is, because I fear we are slipping into  a world of cynicism. If we look at things as simple as cricket that ought to be enjoyed, in such a pessimistic way, then well, Sachin save us :P

Turbunator 2.0

With 101 test caps and 413 wickets, one would wonder how Harbhajan Singh missed out on the Indian team for three consecutive years especially considering how badly we fared up in the spin department during that time where we were outclassed by Lyon on Australian pitches, the English duo of Swann and Monty on Indian pitches and most embarrassingly by Moeen Ali in the English summer last year.  But Ashwin, Jadeja and Ojha, for their part, did not perform so poorly that it set the alarm bells ringing. Dhoni, as we have known him, doesn’t drop players once he gives them chance and to be fair, all of them kept improving with each outing. But have they improved enough?

How the tables have turned!

That was the question facing the new Dada on the block, Kholi. He has an aggressive personality and he wants match winners. And the first thing he does after getting full time captaincy is roping in a true established match winner of Indian Cricket- Bhajji.

Now, I am a quintessential sentimental Indian cricket fan who would love to see all the old boys back in the team, from the yuvrajs to the zaheers to the sehwags to the gambhirs and this development only fills my heart. But I had to ask myself, is it the best foot forward for Indian cricket? By taking a step backwards? I am pretty sure many fans like me wondered.

Harbhajan’s performance in the last two Ranji Seasons did not augur for consideration let alone selection. In 2013-14 season, he played 6 matches for 22 wickets and the 2014-15 season, 3 matches for 6 wickets, dishing out performances that wouldn’t force himself back into the Indian Test Team. Yet he makes a comeback into a Test squad solely on the form and rhythm displayed in a T20 league. And the third spinner in the squad Karn Sharma too was picked based on his T20 exploits. It’s definitely not a reassuring sign.

Having said that, I am still betting on Kholi and the selectors to have made the right decision. That is because cricket is more than just numbers. It’s about instinct after a certain level. Karn Sharma, though was beaten all over the park in his first test in Adelaide, is a good enough spinner to the eye, and he has to develop his trade on the move with the team due to the dearth of other quality leg spinners running in the circuit and also because of the time it would take for him to develop on “greener” Indian tracks (For reference to ‘greener’, read: http://www.espncricinfo.com/ranji-trophy-2014-15/content/story/813007.html ) , and as far as Bhajji is concerned, we all know that the veterans are always just one match away, and if a T20 league could supply enough of confidence to push Bhajji to that one match, it would do.

Bhajji's new spell

Bhajji not only got the numbers behind himself in IPL8 but also impressed everyone with his spells. He was accurate, spun the ball well with good flight and varying loops. One could see that everything was going well for Bhajji with the ball. Bhajji’s inclusion could also be justified on the lines that it is important for selectors, the media and also the fans, to not get carried away by all the talk about “future” as concentrating on the match and series at hand is the best way to go forward.

If Bhajji would get a look-in in the one-match test series remains to be seen, but if he does, we would all love to see the Turbunator back at his best, delivering match turning performances, because Indian Cricket needs him, an experienced quality spinner, more than ever. I and legions of fans like me, wish him the best!

PS: He is Dada's boy, a fighter! So even the harshest of his critics will soon be biting their tongue. XD

World Cup 2015: Darkest of the dark horses

England has experienced almost everything in the past year, except of course winning (Nope, a Test series win against India doesn’t count, because almost anybody could do it). And with the kind of challenges England has in 2015, things look all set to go terribly down south. Except.

Except that England has finally done what it should have done long ago: Sacking Cook from ODI captaincy and the team. While it is tough to ascertain things from a television set, that man surely took the London climate, of being wet and miserable, all around with the ODI outfit.

So the same team, minus Cook, looks altogether different, now. While many cricket experts do acknowledge this, they have most certainly, written off the English Team from the world cup. And they are fair to do so, because their new captain, Eoin Morgan, is struggling for his own form and he has hardly captained the English team on more than 10 occasions. And he certainly does not look like a MS Dhoni to learn it on the job. (Don’t forget the ’07 T20 world cup fellas, an inexperienced captain, did lift it)

But when we dig deeper than what the face value of this team offers, there is promise, potential and most certainly, the hunger. In Ian Bell, they have a Rohit Sharma, who is more likely to fail than succeed but on his day, has the potential to take the game away from the opponent. And in Moeen Ali, they have surfaced an opener who is willing to take his risks and set the scorers straight, and add to it his off spinners, he surprisingly, becomes one of the most valuable players of this team.

Chris Woakes performance could be crucial to this English team

And in Joe root, Eoin Morgan and Ravi Bopara, they have got the class acts and cool heads that could guide the team through the tricky situations. And in Alex hales and Chris Woakes (as allrounders), and Jos Bulter (as keeper), they have got the men to give out killer punches. Though they lack the experience, they are reputed, established, T20 players, who could take bowling attacks apart on their day. The biggest advantage that these three would certainly enjoy this world cup, is the freedom. The freedom that comes along with absolutely no pressure of expectations.

And in Stuart Broad, they have got the senior who could calm the nerves of his bowling attack. While it remains to be seen if Jimmy Anderson makes it to the XI, Chris Jordan himself hasn’t been doing too badly. In Stuart Broad, Chris Jordan, Chris Woakes, and Ravi Bopara, they have the seam bowling attack that could certainly be containing, and on their day, even lethal. And in Tredwell and Ali, they have got the spin attack that could tie things down from one end.

England seems to have the perfect balance that a few other big ticket teams lack. They have more than one seam bowling allrounder and one batsman who could spin. They have more than two destructive batsmen, and more than two class acts. If the experience factor and other off-the-field controversies are put aside, this team certainly looks like an ODI outfit that could go all the way this world cup. England could well be your secret bet.   

If History has taught us one thing in the game of cricket, then it is that, experience and statistics don’t matter in World Cups. Kapil’s Devils did it in 1983, MSD did it in ’07, and now can Eoin Morgan and this English Team do it? Only time will tell.