It has become a habit for us Indians now, win tests at home,
and lose tests abroad. We go abroad and we get pummeled. In the last 10 tests
we have played abroad, we have lost 9!!!
So, what is the problem?
The problem is - we have killed our killer instinct!
We have upset OUR cricket eco system without realizing it.
The game of Cricket is very much like the jungle, with its hierarchy.
The bowler is the carnivore, the predator, the destroyer. The batsman is the
herbivore, feeding on the flora, the runs. Any shift in this balance and the
herbivore rules the jungle. Albeit for a short time! Slowly but surely, the
flora would dry up and push the entire jungle to extinction.
Sounds farfetched?
Now, start thinking.
Name the top South
African superstars – Allan Donald, Jacques Kallis, Dale Steyn, Hashim Amla?
Australians- Sir Don,
the Chappell brothers, Ponting, Waugh, Lilliie, Thomson, Warne, McGrath?
West Indies - Garfield
Sobers, Clive Lloyd, Viv Richards, Gordon Greenidge, Michael Holding, Andy
Roberts, Malcolm Marshall, Joel Garner and in the last two decades – Brain
Lara.
Pakistan – Imran Khan, Wasim Akram, Waqar Younis, Saeed
Ajmal , may be Inzamam and Miandad?
India – Gavaskar, Tendulkar, Merchant, Azhar, Dravid, Ganguly,
Laxman, Kapil, Kumble, Bedi ?
Clear isn’t it?
Teams win tests when the bowlers and batsmen get equal
glory.
In India, fame has followed only the batsmen, hurting our
chances of team glory.
So, where does the problem start?
It starts very early.
From childhood, a
budding cricketer idolizes the batting stars, wants to emulate them. When a kid
scores runs, it makes headlines, but when a kid takes wickets, the batsmen have
done a poor job!
We hear stories of Kohli being the next Tendulkar, Prithvi
Shaw being the next Kohli, but we NEVER hear of the Bedi, Kapil or Kumble in
the making.
So much so that, if a boy were to tell his parents that he
wants to be a bowler, he would be actively dissuaded.
Despite the dissuasion, if that boy makes progress as a
bowler, he faces a far tougher test -that of the pitches. Most often, for a
pace bowler in India, it is blood, sweat, toil but only tears.
After the enormous struggle, when he reaches the highest
echelons, he finds discrimination, again. This time from the media and the
judges!
Take the recent example of Rohit Sharma and Mohammed Shami who
debuted in the same match, in India. Shami showed that he could clean bowl
batsmen, an extreme Indian rarity and a thing a joy. Rohit proved to be a flat
track bully.
But, who wins the Man of the Match awards, the endorsements? Rohit!
What does Shami get?
As Kapil Sharma (of Comedy Nights with Kapil fame) says - Babaji ki Thullu?
So, when it pays to be an herbivore, who wants to be a
carnivore? Who will give us our killer instinct?
If we fete, felicitate and feed the buffaloes, the antelopes
and the elephants while starving the tigers, hyenas and the lions, the jungle
would become barren land.
Just like the trophy chest of our test cricket exploits
abroad – barren!
