Thursday, December 15, 2005

[India,Cricket] The sad procession continues

Will any Indian cricket legend ever get a decent sendoff. I was a pre-teen when Gavaskar retired after scoring a near century. But after that it has been one humiliating spectacle after another. First you had Kapil Dev who labored on and on in pursuit of Hadlee's record of most Test wickets. It was so embarrassing to watch THE Kapil Dev getting carted all over the ground by people who were not even half the cricketer that he once was. Then came Azhar. He used to be my favorite batsman, the guy I used to idolize during my career as a 'gali' cricketer. When the entire nation was swooning over the little god with curly hair, Azhar was the guy I wanted to watch. Well, he went ahead and got involved in match fixing and that was the end of his career.

And now Saurav Ganguly's career has pretty much ended - thanks to the selectors. Dropping him at this point is completely wrong in my opinion. Yes, on current form there are others who deserve a place more than him. If current form is the only criteria for selection, then he should have been dropped right at the beginning of the series. If you selected this guy after all the captaincy controversies that happened, you should have given him enough chances to prove himself. He just got 3 innings - one of them completely inconsequential. That's just not fair. It's ironic that the guy who as captain stood up for youngsters and ensured that they got a fair run has not been shown the same curtsey. I find it really sad that his career has to end this way.

I hope Tendulkar, Dravid and Kumble all of whom are in their final stretches get a better sendoff than this.

1 comment:

Marina said...

Thanks!

I think they could tell I was fragile and could not have handled 3 weeks of waiting without a mental breakdown :)