Letter of the Day
December 20, 2002
A Mirage
To the rediff cricket team - Prem Panicker and Faisal Shariff
I was one of the most ardent followers of Indian cricket. If you
had noticed that I made that statement in the past tense, then you
were right. I no longer believe that the Indian cricket team and
the BCCI have it in them to make the Indian team a fighting unit
that would give the likes of Australia and SA a run for their
money in the WC 2003.
After the match fixing scandals there was a period when I followed
very little of Indian cricket. Being based in the US it was easy
for me to avoid any talk of cricket. Off late, I thought there
was a change in the approach - specially the last couple of series
in WI and England when the Indian team opted for the 'horses for
courses' policy and dropped some senior names. This was more
evident in the ODI team which reflected in Tendulkar dropping down
the order and the young turks leading the side to victory despite
the failure of the senior batsmen.
The general feeling was that this team was different from the
teams of the 80s and 90s - they meant business and there were no
partisan selections just to please a few (despite the Murali
Kartik exclusion).
Alas, it was a mirage, a pipe dream or call it what you may. This
team management as well as those 'bunch of jokers' have shown
their true colours when it mattered most - selecting a team for
the World Cup. The list of probables as described by Faisal is a
joke. (Please see Sulekha Sports section for a thread which uses
the same description). The non-inclusion of Kartik and Pathan and
inclusion of Srinath, Agarkar and Kumble for the NZ series also
smack of favouritism and a exposes a sinister plot in 'resting'
Kumble for the NZ tests. The team that is most likely to go, in
my opinion, to the World Cup would be as follows:
Sehwag, Ganguly, Agarkar, SRT, Dravid, Yuveraj, Kaif, Kumble,
Srinath, Bhaji, Zaheer, Bangar, Patel, Laxman.
Please mark my words - we will not make it to the Super six with
this team.
Signing off as one highly disappointed former Indian cricket
fan.
Shankar
Previous letters:
