Girilal Jain, the late editor of The Times of India, once wrote that in India i.e. Bharat, politics sets the pace, everything else follows in its wake. And as a grieving nation comes to terms with the sudden and untimely demise of its leathery hopes, we are seeing that prognosis play out in full. The coach is blaming the players. The players are blaming the coach. The board is blaming everybody except itself.
Greg Chappell‘s leak that the senior players were acting like a “mafia” has drawn a full-blooded response from Sachin Tendulkar, who has said that never once in his 17-year career had his attitude been questioned. Is Chappell pitting player vs player to save his skin? Or are some players—with the silent OK of their puppeteers in the Board—playing politics to pull Chappell and Rahul Dravid down? Who is telling the truth? Chappell or Sachin? Or is it ridiculous to question the Master Blaster’s commitment just because some white-skinned man tells us so?
sachin.
Greg Chappell is clearly being too clever by half with all these leaks. The team has lost and come back, but it is time to move on for him and for some seniors. Instead by casting aspersions on Tendulkar & Co, Chappell has clearly overstayed his visit. Tendulkar may be no angel, but who is? Does a batsman score 25,000 runs in international runs to be now questioned of his commitment to the team and cause? I suspect that Chappell’s outburst, and his brother Ian Chappell’s gratuitous advice to Sachin to review his future, are one of a piece. One wonders what is going through Rahul Dravid’s mind.
I think this is again a clever Australian strategy to demorlise Sachin. Sachin may not have won many matches for us and like all humans may have failed in crucial matches. But I believe that his commitment cannot be doubted. He has played long enough to involve in these things now. It is 2 different things – to fail in a match and not to have commitment. Lets not mix up these 2 things.
It appears that both Chappels (Greg and Ian) have planned out this attack on Sachin and have timed it to perfection. They probably want Sachin to be demotivated and ensure Ponting overshadows Sachin. Its time for Chappels to shut up and Greg to leave. It is surprising why John Wright did not have such problems (Infact all the ‘mafia’ members he is referring were present then).
The board has made a mistake by delaying the meeting till the weekend and allowed everybody to talk and harm Indian cricket. And to top it all if the report was not yet submitted to the board who has leaked it to the media. Chappel himself???. If so Why????
Hasnt Ponting already overshadowed Tendya?
A test average of 59+ against 54 for SRT, two world cup trophies (And very possibly a third!) – one as captain, ICC player umpteen times and the excitement he brings into the game- never mind the rude and rough edges.
Tendya plays well no doubt but the utter selfishness of his game, where he is plays to only rewrite his records and desperately wants to please his sponsors shines thru’.
Truly did Goldsmith say ‘ Where wealth accumulates, men decay’- there is no fire in the belly anymore when he plays and methinks the fire was dousewd out long ago.
This is the ‘pits’ for Indian cricket.The unfolding scenario in the meeting would be: a fourth of the board , joined by Ex- captains will blame,Chappell.Another quater will blame the senior players who should have played well on the field,instead of ‘tanking’ the game.The other half will blame the media and advertisers!
Future of Indian cricket?The Players who played irresponsibly will be let out with a feeble warning. The captain will be dropped. The coach of course will go. Finally the Board as always disunited ,will one day pack up and go.
This will become easy for Zee Subash Chandra to take the main stage – a la Kerry Packer.ICC which hates BCCI , will one day recognise Chandra’s ICL, because it will be headed by Dalmia….
Gaby, you’ve said it all mate!
Who cares who is lying and who isn’t ….I just cant have enough of Indian cricket , its too freaking cool to hear all the ex captains , WAGs, inlaws , outlaws ,ex managers, groundsmen , neighbours , bookies talking about Indian cricket.
Good that we didn’t progress further, my humble suggestion to all is to be dispassionate about Indian cricket and enjoy the media fun ride. The best place to enjoy ones cricket is at the gully/road/local field level.
When their goose is cooked everbody lies and so with Chappell and Sachin. In the end it is good for the cricket for it will die a natural death.
I think we are all loosing the point. That Indian cricket is at its worst is a point beyond argument. The only way is up and we can’t go further down. But the focus should be is why is Chappel making these allegations now and not earlier. Also why is Sachin’s commitment being questioned now after playing 17 long years. Commitment will not change over one match.
Chappel
On second thoughts, merely because Sachin has reacted thus, should we assume that Greg Chappell is the only coach to have negative feelings about Sachin’s attitude? Maybe others before him too have had such thoughts but did not find the courage to air their views. Maybe they were just too busy feathering their nests.
News reports are suggesting that even the administrative manager on the World Cup tour Sanjay Jagdale has made the same comments as Chappell in his tour report, that the senior players were hankering after individual glory. So, if both the non-administrative heads of the team, one white, one brown, held the same opinion, then surely there must be some truth to the basic charge?
Chappell’s gone now. His ideas and processes thrown into the dustbin of Indian history by an unforgiving public, unmotivated players, and a myopic Board.
Tendulkar’s on his way out. His body has long passed his prime, and his ‘re-invention’ has been an utter failure. He has become what we long believed of most other Indian batsmen, a flat track bully. That too against mediocre attacks only.
Stupid conspiracy theories aside, Sachin has dropped in the ranks of international batsmen when compared to the likes of Lara, Ponting, Fleming, Hayden, Jayasuriya, Mohammed Yousuf, Kallis, and even Chris Gayle, when one compares his record for the last 3-4 years to theirs. This is not even counting younger batsmen like Pietersen, Graeme Smith, Hussey, et al who have age on their side.
None of this really tells us who is telling the truth, but it something we have to keep in mind before falling to emotional rants about ‘Indian culture’, ‘Aussie conspiracy’, etc.
With dexterity of BCCI Marketing skills in getting sponsors to the Indian Team before World Cup has done nothing but changing the attitude of the Indian Players. Cricket has grown more than a religion in India and when these GODS failed to deliver reality bit the billion people back in India. Reasons for failure are blossoming like flowers in spring no matter if its Coach or senior player. No one wants to think what needs to be done next. Not even BCCI. Same happened with Sania Mirza in Tennis. People expected her so much she started to deliver less. I think its high time for people in India to start diverting their attention towards other games and give Cricket a break!
Because we know, in a situation like this everyone wants to comment. All I would say is…
“Everyone wants to go to HEAVEN, but no one wants to DIE”
The problem with so called senior players is that they are basking in yesterday’s glory. Sachin and his cohorts have singularly failed to deliver goods when it mattered. It is time that these players were forcibly retired and
fresh blood is brought in, and train them forgetting international fixtures for a considerable time. After all a coach can only do so much and the players must perform at the crease for the team to succeed. Consistency has never been the mantra as far as Indian team is concerned. The future of Indian cricket is very bleak indeed.
Its pity that we have to analyze who saying the truth. Sachin has postponing his retirement stating his fitness and Chappell blaming the team after world cup debacle.
Both were @ the wrong ends…………………….BCCI should take some tough decisions regarding Sr.Players and appoint a new coach. May be Dave Watmore will be the perfect choice as Dugarpur rightly said no Indian has a capacity to coach India.
BCCI should send all Sr. Players home, there by forming a totally new team.
‘Kumbalkayi kalla andre hegal muti nodkonda’ – that’s how Sachin’s reaction was! Chappell is yet to give an official stmt and Sachin has started defending himself. I don’t knw abt Chappell. But, Sachin’s image has surely taken a beating!
You have commenced by quoting the late Girilal Jain. Indeed. he was an editor who was firm in his journalistic ethics and despite being a ‘Jain’ often earned the displeasure of the ToI bosses, the Jains.
All said and done, till the other day, i.e. before the saga of washing of dirty linen in public by the members of Indian cricket squad, journalism was defiend as projecting three types of news:
TRUTH, HALF-TRUTHS and ALL LIES.
Yes, till the other day, TRUTH was solely reserved for sports since none could manipulate the end score card, be it cricket, hockey or any game.
HALF TRUTHS were reserved for the the weather report since the met guys have been always unsure. Hence it is: It may rain or may not rain. Maximum temperature: High; Minimum temperatire: Low. Rainfall for the past 24 hours: Could be guaged since there was a hole in the bucket. Yes, that was HALF TRUTH.
And about ALL LIES, undoubtedly it was nothing but the dirty game of politics played by politicians.
Presto! now even the game of cricket has joined the bandwagon of ALL LIES, courtesy, the mud slinging between Ian Chappell and his cronies on one side and certain ganged-up ‘seniors’ as alleged by him and a couple observers of the game.
But I doubt whether Anil Kumble was a part of this tug-of-war since he is believed to be a gentleman on and off the field. As for SRT, it could be a bout of ego considering the special treatment he has received all these years. Be it the tennis elbow or ping pong knee, the BCCI has borne his treatment expenses. During the 1999 World Cup, for a personal tragedy, he was allowed to fly home when his dear father departed from the world and again rejoin the team.
So it is nothing but a battle of nerves of ego. And we Indians still seem to be eulogise white skin. There is no dearth of coaches in India. In the past we had Keki Tarpore, Salus Nazareth, E B Aibara, P J Deodhar, Hemu Adhikari and today we have Achrekar (I hope I’ve spelt it rightly, the Guru of Gavaskar, Tendulkar, Kambli and Muzumdar) and the likes of Tarak Sinha of Delhi who has produced nearly half a dozen internationals.
The less said the better about the current imbroglio concerning the Indian cricket team