JAMMY AND THE HITMAN:
What Next for Indian Cricket?
Amidst all the Twitter wars between fans of Messrs. Sourav Ganguly and Virat Kohli, it has quietly gone unnoticed that Indian cricket is in the midst of an expansive overhaul. With the T20 and ODI World Cups just around the corner, what is the buildup leading to? 2011? Or 2007?
The shadowy minefield of Indian cricket is so covert, it is overt, and it has reared its head in all its ugly glory once again. In the brash spat between the brash Virat Kohli and the brash Sourav Ganguly, no one knows who is right (if there is even a wholly correct account at all). The great tragedy, though, is that both the disagreements between captain and board, as well as the succession plan for the captain, have been mismanaged spectacularly.
An ideal world hinges on stability – Virat Kohli staying on as Captain across all formats while a younger, calmer K.L. Rahul would be groomed, first as Vice Captain, and then bled in slowly through captaincy in T20s, ODIs and, finally, the Test squad. This, in a roundabout manner, is what Kohli himself had envisaged when stepping down as T20 captain – he would make way for the next generation while providing the experience of the older one, much like Dhoni did previously.
Not that the Kohli-Shastri years were perfect by any stretch. The test successes has rightfully won global plaudits; the ICC tournament failures are glaring. But it is in the minute management decisions that the fallout has found its fuel – the mistreatment of Kuldeep Yadav, the culling of (the admittedly arrogant but brilliant) Ashwin, the inexplicable skewering of balance in the team, the over-reliance on certain players picked on name rather than form.
But the Rohit Sharma era is a non-sequitur. An older captain than the one just gone, and whose CV consists mainly of IPL success, reeks of instant gratification. True foresight, true aptitude in a planning role, demands staying resolute in the willowing, wuthering winds of public opinion and pressure. There is a very real danger that, regardless of Indian success in ICC tournaments in 2022 and 2023, the team will be woefully underprepared to confront the big bad world after Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma have gone. Compound this with Rahane’s removal as Vice-Captain in the place of Sharma, rather than Rahul, and India is teetering on the brink of a 2007-style collapse. That Kohli was (allegedly) notified of his (ODI) sacking a mere 90 minutes before the public, attributed of course to the inherently nonsensical “one white-ball captain” ideal – nonsensical because of the disparity in the ODI and T20 team makeups for India; this probably works well for England or Australia – speaks to the game of thrones the BCCI is (once again) afflicted by.
The saving grace in all this is a certain Mr. Rahul Dravid. It is in his nurturing of youth and impeccably non-abrasive man management skills that the success of the next few years will depend – concurrent short-term and long-term planning. Mr. Peter O’Toole had the insight – “Everyone praises Sachin Tendulkar. He may be a genius in his own right but in my book, Rahul Dravid is the artist. Dravid’s defence tactics, his strokes, his cuts, his grace are truly amazing. I’d like to meet the chap sometime and take my hat off to him.” Indian cricket, at its hedonistic best, has always married style with swagger, elegance with fortitude, tactics with instinct. It is fervently hoped that the South Africa series ignites a period of quiet consistency – both on the pitch and off it. For all artistry is birthed from quiet consistency.
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