September 21, 2009

Triple standards in cricket

March 2008: It takes Virender Sehwag to score a double hundred to cement his spot for the next two series. And when he doesn’t score a double for a while, questions on consistency are asked, naturally.

Imagine then, what happens when Sehwag fails to score a triple century for a full four years.


September 2009. What does Sehwag do while his mates warm-up for the Champions Trophy? He plays in some local game, scores a duck. But he plays. Next he plays in the Irani Trophy on 1st October. His mates will have played the West Indies in their last league match the previous day.

On 2nd and 3rd October are the CT semis, Sehwag will be biding his time in the Irani Trophy.

The call on Sehwag’s fitness was taken way back, so back it’s tough to recall when. It was decided then, that he will be unfit for the Champions Trophy.

The decision was in reaction to the furore caused by his injury in the Twenty20 world. This time, neither the BCCI nor the team management wanted to take any chances with Sehwag’s injury. It did make everyone, including Sehwag, MSD and the Board look clueless.

Now take the case of Sachin Tendulkar, who spends good lengths of time recovering from injury. And when he recovers, he just walks into the playing eleven – there is never any proof of match fitness required, rarely, if ever, is Sachin required to play games to prove his fitness. No captain, cricket board or team management creates scenes.

And then you have Sehwag, playing the Irani and Corporate scene. Granted he wasn’t exactly smooth on the injury front, but that’s Sehwag for you – point is, nobody stood up for him. Instead they went out of the way to make him look like a clueless idiot.

If you were Sehwag, why would you want to captain any team? Be it team India or the Delhi Daredevils.

In the last few weeks, Sehwag is making a clear statement of intent – do not fuck with me, I am not Rohit Sharma or Suresh Raina, and you cannot treat me like them.

I may not be Sachin Temdulkar but then he is not Virender Sehwag either, our paths did cross a long time back.

In the next few months, either India or Sehwag will have another reality check. And that’s where a new standard will be set. One will have to give.

Right now, it looks like India doesn’t deserve Sehwag. For me, he could be the next mercenary cricketer, and a far more devastating one than Flintoff.


On Bored - Jatman: Don't treat me like shi*

3 comments:

Indophile said...

Comeon NC :-) we all love him very much, but make no mistake, Indians are rarely anti establishment; don't confuse his cricketing persona with real life politics. It only took a sugar coated BS from Jaitley to pacify him last time. Its good for him anyway if he is resting, bloody boring IPL2, f* up our T20 world cup and champions trophy by screwing up Viru and Zak.

straight point said...

it took the stature of kumble... defeats in tests in australia to realise team india what they were missing... tell then they kept him waiting on the bench... it would be kind of blasphemy to think recalling sachin and keep him sitting on the bench...

but when they actually 'allowed' him to play in the team... the result was evident from the moment he stepped into field with bat in his hand... and since then team india too looked like a killing machine... wonder what will make dhoni to realise jatman's true potential... genius...

achettup said...

I don't know, maybe they're trying to let this alleged rift in the team simmer down, but I can't imagine anyone seriously believing the Indian team is better off without Sehwag. I wonder how much of this is related to the fracas with the Delhi board... you can offend some very powerful people when you do something like that.