New Season New Thoughts

Indian cricket fans are looking forward to new season, commencing from 24th September with Irani Trophy. The Champion Trophy was cancelled and rightly so because when Pakistan can't guarantee safety of its own citizens, how it can guarantee safety of International players. Pakistan's condition is worsening day-by-day and probably god only knows who is running Pakistan.

So, selectors came up with news that will keep cricket lovers, followers and journalists occupied for next fortnight. Yes, it is about Mr. Saurav Ganguly. It is clear that selectors have dropped him after taking a comprehensive view of fab-four otherwise it would have been Dravid first to go.


A fighter like Ganguly will not go down silently. Ganguly will perform, make a come back and then retire on his own terms. Thats what I feel. When Steve Waugh was going through a bad patch, Australia chief selector spoke to him after second test and very clearly told," Steve, if we don't see improvement from here, the fifth test match of the series may be your last match test." Steve Waugh scored half centuries in third and fourth test match and a century in fifth test match to secure his place. It happened in 2002-2003. And then he quit cricket in 2004 on his own terms.

But this is Australian way of motivation, transparency and communication. When Greg Chappel tried it, Ganguly came up in media and made emotional statements to stir-up controversy. Ultimately it turned out to be worst battle between a captain and coach in which captain lost.

The more interesting part for me is how Tendulkar, Dravid and Laxman wash Mendis agony against Australians. Let’s accept Australian bowling attack is weak and if Brett lee is not able to solve his personal issues in next one week, it may be weaken further. You can't expect more from God as a Indian test match batsman. Score tons of runs and that too against Australia and you are in for next ten test matches. Also, Indian public remembers performance in home matches for a longer time. So, more ads, more contracts and life secured for next 1 year at least.

My player for next season is Virat Kohli. He is cut above the rest and he will find place in one day squad last playing 11. Now Dhoni has to think whom Virat will replace.

*I must tell you a story about this lad's dedication. Virat was batting against Karnataka at 40 odd runs in a domestic match and his father was critical. Virat went home after day's game was over and his father expired. He had option to not resume his batting but to complete last duty as son. But no, this lad came back to match on time, batted and scored some 90 odd runs because Delhi was struggling against Karnataka. He was not out but declared out by umpire. Then he went home and completed his duties. If nothing else, it definitely speaks about mental make-up of Virat Kohli. He will certainly go a long way.

Mohd. Kaif has received manna from God. But he has to perform out of his skin to cash this opportunity. And I think Kaif realizes it. He is a limited strokes player, but he has mental toughness to graft an innings. His critical success factor would be to play as sub-ordinate of Laxman and stitch partnerships.

Rohit Sharma may have to warm the bench if both, Shehwag and Tendulkar make a come back in ODI team. I can see another Mark Ram Prakash in Rohit Sharma and I don't see him travelling very far. He and Yuvi may finally become permanent member of India 20-20 team. Sachin Tendulkar has been included in ICC ODI 11 and if he retires at this juncture, it will benefit both, him as well as a budding youngster. I am not sure if Tendulkar too misses to read selector's mind like Viv Richards did and opted for retirement after being dropped.

My score line for India Australia test series would be 2-1 in favor of India. I think India-England series would be more exciting than India-Australia series in this season.

* - I heard Virat Kohli story from former test cricketer, Mr. Rakesh Shukla.

What India should do?

So, what BCCI will do now? That’s one question crossing every Indian cricket fan. That’s a positive sign for corporate!!! Indian can’t quit thinking about cricket. Right now we have 50 million opinions in India. I am also one of them.

I will again go back to my old point that I discussed after Indian debacle in South Africa. BCCI goes for a short term solution or a long term solution.

India is not short of talent in Cricket but our cricketers lack character. A character is built in adversity and competitive environment. Our institution of domestic cricket is ordinary. It may create good players who look good on Indian pitches but it can’t give you a strong character unit like Australia.

Would you like to see an organization run by people who are part time members and the organization generates close to $1 billion revenue per year? I don’t think any management thinking or any sensible individual will endorse to the view the way our sports organizations are operating on a day-to-day basis. Probably this attitude explains number of Olympic medals won by this 1 billion population country in last 60 years.

The reforms must start from BCCI. Government should stop recognizing BCCI as an autonomous body. It was created to promote Cricket in India which has been accomplished. Now, this body should be dismantled.

Instead government should create a corporate body responsible for cricket. If possible, this corporation should be listed in Share market but government should not become the owner. I guess many corporate will be interested in acquiring the ownership and it can be decided by a fair and comprehensive process.

The corporation should be responsible for overall development and administration of cricket. As I believe this corporation will be governed by able professionals and India have plenty of excellent leaders and managers who will be interested to work for this organization. Listing it on share market will boost people’s interest in share market and at least one crore more investors will join share market which will be definitely better for our bourses. India has currently approximately 4 crore people out of 100 crore who invest in equities either directly or through other various financial instruments.

The domestic cricket structure needs a major boost. I watch Ranji trophy and other domestic tournaments on Neo sports and it tells the true level of cricket competitiveness and standard. BCCI has least bothered to attract people to watch these games. The key lies here. Once you attract people to these games, the competition and character will start coming to teams.

The number of teams should be limited. Not more than 4 or 5. The new corporation should ensure a time period when this tournament will be held and participation of top cricketers must be mandatory.

This also calls for pitch reforms. The pitches for these matches should be fast and varying in nature. Then you have a domestic infrastructure in place to select top 15 players.

The team selection process should be changed as well. You have 3 selectors who decide the team and then the captain…not other way round. Had this been the case, Ganguly would have been out of the team after 2003 world cup and many individuals who cried after Srilanka game would have been playing either domestic cricket or county cricket in England.

These are sweeping reforms. People at top hate reforms in this country. This reform may take time to settle and produce results but it will ensure that we don’t feel ashamed after each tour of South Africa and Australia.

Listing the corporation on share market will ensure accountability to the public and public will feel a part of Indian cricket. At present, fans (the customers of BCCI) are last consideration for BCCI. If you don’t believe it, buy a one day international ticket and enjoy your experience in the stadium. It is pathetic right from ticket purchase to last ball bowled.

Now, let’s look at our current team. This team has performed pathetically in every foreign tour from West Indies to South Africa to Malaysia (except Pakistan). It has performed badly in champion trophy. That performance should have been enough to draw attention but we start reacting when water goes above the head and breathing becomes impossible. We wait and wait till the situation becomes worst.

The game at top level is played by character and attitude, talent becomes secondary because every team has plenty of it. The tough character comes through difficult experiences…at least not when you hit knee-roll high balls to boundary 40 times a day in a Ranji trophy game against a weak opposition. You may be given opportunity to open Indian innings in test match in Australia after scoring triple century against Tripura but nobody remembers your name thereafter. I was talking about Devang Gandhi.

One typical case is Mr. Agarkar who even after 183 one day matches looks mediocre on many days. He performs once in a while and claims his place back? Why? Because we simply don’t have enough players or we don’t believe them good enough to replace Pathans and Agarkars. Murali Kartik is gone… he could have been definitely a good replacement for Anil Kumble and Ramesh Powar for Harbhajan Singh! Alas! We are so obsessed with brands that when it comes to crunch tournaments, we go by brand names rather than current form. Pathan selection is a typical example…he was selected and not selected…both are true. These men at BCCI are so confused!!!

India needs fresh blood and confident men who believe in destroying opposition and in hanging on 50 overs on any pitch. My next captain is Yuvraj; he has played more than 150 one dayers and has enough experience. Rahul Dravid may be retained in the team as a batsman, but not Ganguly, Shehwag and Tendulkar. Mohd Kaif should be back as vice captain.
BCCI has more data and information to select rest of the team. Munaf Patel and Sreesaanth should be retained. Rest of the lot should decide what they want to do next in life.
You may disagree with my team but my emphasis is on reforms and selecting 11 men who believe in themselves to beat any team on any pitch and they do it day-in and day-out. Even if, everybody in this country agrees to my reform agenda, we will take at least 5-6 years to produce results. Australians were patient…they invested close to 10 years to become number 1.

You may also take a deep breath after reading and say “come on – it is just a game!” You are also right.

My comments on Cricket

Let me take a dig at Mr. Speed. Malcom Speed has once again tried his best to stir the Indian nation. He can’t digest Indians as economic superpower of cricket. But, Mr. Malcom Speed should also read business pages of his tabloid and learn that India, as a nation is emerging as a superpower. Tata Steel has bought Corus, the UK national pride. Mr. Speed also talked about Indian performance in recent matches; he must look at his own team which has been reduced to nothing except that they won Ashes 2005. I am ready to discuss about his team performance before and after Ashes 2005 and Mr. Speed will not find the discussion interesting. Mr. Speed, if we Indians want, we can have our own world cups and we don’t want ICC as a governing body of cricket which does nothing but provoking racism on and off the cricket field. Mr. Speed, please wake up and accept Indian superiority or mind your own business.

Indians were humbled in the current ICC Champions Trophy in its own den. It doesn’t happen frequently with our lions. The Indians look tough to beat in India but anything is possible with this team in its current form.

The problem starts from the beginning, be it bowling or batting. Virender Shehwag is not firing in the ODIs and it is taking a toll on Indian Team. The question is why we are giving him too many chances? Just because he is vice captain of the team or Greg Chappel and Rahul Dravid are more than happy to bet on this endless gamble?

Virender Shehwag needs to emulate Chris Gayle who is responsible for West Indies performance in ICC Champions Trophy. Chris Gayle is improving day-by-day as a cricketer and contributing more than handful in all departments of the game.
The number three position is being rotated ridiculously as a music chair in Indian Team. Any team must ensure in One day Cricket that its best batsmen plays maximum number of overs. Going by this logic, Mr. Dependable should come at number three and play an anchor sheet role to provide smooth and robust platform for our aggressive batsmen. What business Irfan Pathan has to do here? Let’s play cricket in a simple and no-nonsense way. Innovation is an important ingredient of strategy; however, it should not come at the cost of compromising with the basic fundamentals and start resulting in losses. If India needs to chase more than 300 score, I can understand the logic of Irfan Pathan walking at number 3 and showing intentions to blast 50 on 40 balls. But if India is batting first, a grafter should play at number three.

Irfan Pathan must concentrate on his bowling and his job is to get India early breakthroughs. When Irfan Pathan doesn’t get early wickets, Indian bowling looks pathetic and toothless. If Irfan Pathan doesn’t get back to his bowling rhythm, he will go Zaheer Khan’s way and it will be cruel for the youngster. Irfan Pathan is only good as a bowler, he should aim to be great and join the league of Walsh, McGrath etc.

The team India has lost confidence after West Indies debacle. The body language of players shows it. Their body language had conveyed the match result against Aussies. The team was looking awfully short on match preparation part. When we were batting, we could not hit boundaries, feeling as if 22 players were fielding in the ground. When we were bowling, we had forgotten that Ponting was in bad form but we bowled him on his strength and helped him immensely to gain form.

We have to look forward now. Indian team is going to face South Africa where we have not won for last 14 years. Dravid and Chapel should select 11 appropriate men on the match day and win all the matches. I have seen Dravid doing blunders when it comes to last 11. The recent example is match against West Indies. The liftman of the hotel, where the Indian team stayed, will tell you that West Indians are weak against spin bowling. I could not understand playing R. P. Singh against West Indies when Ramesh Powar was need of the hour.
I think Dilip Vengasarkar is right where he commented about talent available in India. It calls for the reforms in Indian Domestic tournaments. There must be a prime tournament where only 6-7 teams should participate. We have more than 20 teams playing in Ranji Trophy where there is yawning gap in talent across teams. It reduces the intensity of the matches and batting or bowling performances can’t and should not be compared. The tournament must ensure matches on variety of pitches and there we can find talent which will match to international standard or will be closer to international standard. Greg Chapel should understand the difference between Indian Domestic Cricket Structure and Aussies Domestic Cricket Structure. I have heard Dennis Lilee saying,”I enjoyed playing for Shield tournament more than Test Matches some times.” Therefore, when it comes to selection, Domestic as well as International experience and performance, both should be taken into consideration. I believe V. V. S. Laxman is better bet than Raina. I heard somebody talking about fielding. Okay, if you don’t have enough runs on board in the first place, what will you achieve by saving 10 odd runs in the field??? I don’t find our batting line up convincing on the South African pitches against their pace battery.