The Bigger Picture-Diseases ailing Indian Cricket

As is always the case,we need these kind of face-hiding defeats to reflect upon what went wrong.As is again the case always,cosmetic measures will be taken to evade striking at the roots.But one has to ask this question:Can such a pasting come all of a sudden?Or,was it a tragedy waiting to happen?If you are more inclined to ask the second question,as you should be,then the answer is Systemic Failure!

So what is systemic failure?Why systemic failure?Right from the administration,the selection panel,the players,IPL,the cricekting community.Tried to list some of the factors:

1.Conflicts of Interest:Well,these abound in Indian Cricket.Kapil Dev was sacked as chairman of the NCA as BCCI thought that him getting associated with the ICL was against the interests of the game in India.But then,Ravi Shastri is on the governing board of the IPL,Harsha Bhogle has assisted Mumbai Indians and they also have a million dollar contract from BCCI for commentary.And what about the king of them all,N Srinivasan and Krish Srikkanth!!One,Co-owner of CSK and the other,the brand ambassador of that team respectively.Grill Srikkanth, and he will admit that he favours players from CSK and Tamil Nadu.By the way,Shastri is now the chairman of NCA(Bangalore).I wonder how many times he has been there since 2007

2.The IPL:There was always a concern with the franchisee model as to wheteher the business interests of the franchisees co-exist with the interests of the game.As is evident by now,they cant, and we are seeing that it is the game that is losing out to the business-men.IPL teams want more and more matches every year,more ads between deliveries leaving very little focus on the game.When an IPL party ticket is sold for thousands of rupees to public,it is a kind of unsaid pressure on the player to be a part of it.Not that they are not willing to attend!Worse is, the effect the format has, on the players.When Dwayne Bravo was asked to rate his loyalties for the teams that he plays for,he rated Trinidad and Tobago,Mumbai Indians and then the West Indies in order.Chris Gayle,captain of a test playing nation says,Test Cricket should be scrapped.Am sure most players in India would echo similar feelings, but in a cricket passionate nation,they would be foolish to say that in public.So this is yet another disaster waiting to happen:India suffering in Test Cricket in the years to come

3.Lack of professionalism:In India,a batsmen is expected to bat well only,a bowler is expected to bowl only.Absolutely no effort is made to grow into all-round cricketers.By all round,i do not mean that every body should be able to bat and bowl,but there is simply no reason why a good batsmen cannot be a good-fielder and a good runner between the wickets.For fast bowlers,the norms can be slightly relaxed since they will be more tired in the field than other players,but no-where near the levels shown by Indian bowlers and by the way,they are not fast as well.A true professional would know the effect of a late night party on the next game.One very intriguing aspect of the IPL parties has been that players from both teams who played the game that day would be seen later in the party.Now, why would you want to party after you have lost a game? Commitment anybody?

4.Escapist cricketing community:This has been the bane of Indian cricket for a long time.It is very frustrating to see that people who hold some power in the game in India being silent to all the mess that Indian Cricket has found itself in .At a time when Sachin should have said that he will not play the IPL till it comes out clean,we instead hear him saying that IPL will be back,it is good for Indian cricket etc etc.When Gavaskar was asked whether Yuvraj was the biggest disappointment of IPL3,he deflects the attention on Yuvraj by saying that Gilchrist was more disappointing.Good lord,who cares about that aging Gilchrist!Point is everybody wants a good name for themselves.Nobody wants to talk about that elephant in the room!

So whats the way out?A systemic failure needs a major overhaul.For starters, drop players who have grown bigger than the sport.Make them realise what it takes to wear the tri-colour on the helmet.Make the adminstrators believe they are mere facilitators of this beautiful game and nothing more.