India Vs. England: Ignominy in the offing?

Let’s face it. We have been duped. By ‘we’ I mean all the following: the paying public in England (believe me the prices are steep), the TV audience in India (very few care for cricket in England, especially on TV), the sponsors who have paid hefty sums to secure some precious seconds between overs to sell their products, and most importantly England and the Indian team. We were told that this was going to be the battle of heavyweights. Between two teams who were equals. And now what seems like a condescendingly stupid joke, England were supposed to be India’s equals because they were playing in their own conditions. We were told that this will be the ultimate celebration of test cricket and will reaffirm its holy grail-esque status. It isn’t any of it. It is like one goes to the Wimbledon Final to watch Federer vs Nadal at their very best and instead gets to watch either Nadal or Federer brushing aside a hapless first round wild card opponent ranked 400.

After a long time, in fact after more than a decade, I am getting the hollow feeling I used to get when India toured for test matches. There was a sense of inevitability to those sojourns in the nineties. Indians would have an individual brilliant knock in the first innings, mostly by Sachin, combust in the second primarily by the bouncing ball and lose the match by a big margin of either runs or wickets. A trend that went on for a long long time, and sadly, is threatening to rear its ugly head back.

It will be easy to blame Dhoni. But if ever there was a man who shouldn’t be blamed, it is he. He is a shrewd, amazingly calm and an articulate man and captain. And in some cases he has shown that he is capable of some superhuman acts. However, this tour, quite simply was beyond him. If it is beyond him, it is beyond anybody in India, or for that matter in the world. It was akin to a hugely successful but overworked CEO being asked to retain the market leadership of his company while all his vice-presidents, the very people who were responsible for the company’s ascent to the top, being removed from their positions for burnout and novices being appointed instead. And, oh, by the way, the CEO will have no say in the planning.

The Indian Officials need to ask themselves: Do we really care for the team’s five day cricket supremacy? The key word here is the ‘supremacy’. All the boards across the globe make the right noises about caring for test cricket, some of them seriously so, like Australia and England. I am sure many people in the Indian Board care for Test Cricket and they would continue organizing test tours. However what they need to ponder over is whether it is really worth it to chase the supremacy in this format. If the answer is yes, then something has to give in. Either the 74 match seriously tiring cricket masked by the shindig of filmstars and wannabes called IPL or the pointless one day matches against Sri-Lanka and West-Indies. Because they can’t win it all. And especially can’t win it all by preparing badly. My vote is for the pointless one dayers being done away with. Indians should return after the test series in England.

I fear a white-wash in this series. Rahul Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar and VVS Laxman don’t deserve a white-wash at this stage of their magnificent careers or even a 0-3 scoreline. What the people who have charted the itinery have ensured is that these men, who are national heroes, face the terrible ignominy of returning home with their heads hanging in shame after a resounding defeat. They would never admit it, but it would forever scar them. They wouldn’t mind the hit and giggle of IPL (they wouldn’t giggle really), but if you asked them what they value the most, it would be India’s test performances, especially overseas. I guess, we will continue with the shameful tradition of mistreating the honor of our heroes. Be it the ones in armed forces, or social services or in sports.

This article cannot be complete without paying a tribute to this superlative England team. They could well be the best England team of the last 25 odd years. A team that has Graeme Swann coming in at no. 10 and I am sure he wouldn’t be too chuffed about his batting slot. There must’ve been a debate between Broad and Bresnan about who deserves the number eight spot. Matt Prior is the best wicketkeeper-batsman in test cricket and a depressing sight for the opposition to see walking in at number seven. Pietersen is prepared to grind his way through and Bell is on his way to become a right handed David Gower. They have vanquished India without their openers firing, Jonathan Trott having a sub 40 average for the series and Swann having a bad time with his spin. And they have vanquished India, make no bones about it. Apart from the session in Lords when Ishant Sharma discovered why he is considered a real threat, and a few sessions in the second test, they have dominated India. It is a contest between unequals, quite simply because England ‘eleven’ is made up of ten batsmen and four bowlers whereas Indian ‘eleven’ is playing with four batsmen and three bowlers.

Let’s pray that Sehwag strolls back into this depressed and jaded team and uplifts them with a marauding double hundred at Edgbaston. Gambhir returns at the top and brings with him his true grit. Crucially, Zaheer Khan returns to take his share of premium English wickets and lead the young bowling attack. Let’s hope they drop Harbhajan and bring in Munaf Patel who would at least keep the things quiet or Amit Mishra who might not do worse than the turbanator. This neutering of Harbhajan’s threat by English batsmen is heartbreaking to watch. I wonder if a drop from the team might just be the tonic he needs to bring back the sting in his tweakers.

And most importantly, the team and its tired captain summon every ounce of skill and determination to avoid giving a haunting memory of a disgraceful defeat to Tendulkar, Dravid and Laxman.