IPL: The False Heroes

Location: An alleyway near a marketTime: 11.00 pmConditions: Extremely Cloudy and windy

Scene: A boy and a girl, both in their teens are walking through the market nearing an alleyway after a late night movie show. It’s a windy and a conspicuous night, the sort of night where one can feel the change of season approaching. Suddenly a goon enters and tries to attack the girl. The boy, flamed up with rage, lifts a stray bottle and rams it onto the goon’s head. The battle is won. He goes and hugs the girl. Woken up by the confrontation, the grocers staying nearby come out and hail the boy as a hero.

Had Paul Valthaty scored one more century, he would have ruined his chances

What happens next? Is he really the big picture hero? Agreed that the boy beat up the goon but surely it doesn’t mean that he is ready to enter into a ring against Evander Holyfield the next day. Common logic says that. However logic and IPL are two sides of the same coin. The moolah that has been raked in is exemplary and the amount of heroes the IPL has created, admonitory. There have been four seasons now, the fifth one is on its way and sadly there still hasn’t been one player who has set the international stage on fire. Worse, they have been given international stints when the players themselves would agree that they were not up for it. There’s no denying the fact that IPL provides a platform for all the youngsters to showcase their skills but that’s where the hydraulics should stop. Had Paul Valthaty scored one more century in the last season of the IPL he would have been quickly drafted into the Indian team. Luckily for him and India, he wasn’t. The question is not whether they have the talent or not, the question lies in whether they have done enough to warrant an international cap. Giving a half cooked meal to a visitor is not the best way to earn repute and the selectors have done exactly that by donning out international caps to youngsters based on their two months of glory ride.

First Class era vs IPL era

What wrong did the likes of Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid and VVS Laxman do? The answer is that they played first class cricket, so much of it that they eventually turned out to be the best of their era. Sadly first class cricket is no more the yardstick of brilliance, it’s just a backdrop to the main stage of IPL. If cricket has to evolve, this has to change. A Michael Hussey should look at a Shaun Marsh and shoot himself on the head. I mean here’s a guy who had to wait a good 10-15 years on the sidelines despite his 16,000 first class and 6,000 List A runs. Shaun Marsh on the other hand doesn’t have a great first class record to boast of but still finds himself in the Australian team after only one season of IPL. The difference however lies in the way their careers panned out. Hussey went on to become a great server of Australian cricket whereas Marsh finds himself dropped after a string of pathetic performances.

Let’s take India’s situation now. Rahul Sharma comes into the Indian team after one season of IPL performance. Is this a justifiable selection? A spinner gets to hone his wicket taking skills and develop his abilities only in the longer format; Sharma’s inclusion came at a time when his first class records read 12 matches, 25 wickets at an average of 44.64. Surely Rahul Sharma needed some more time in the domestic circuit? By pushing him headfirst into the international arena you are losing out on what we Indians say the ‘lambi race ka ghoda’ for momentary gains. This too particularly at a time when India is facing the lack of a quality spinner. It pains to see someone like R Ashwin going to a tour and coming out as the third best batsman in terms of batting average (32.60) for India when he is quite clearly expected to top the bowling charts. The fact that his bowling average is twice his batting average tells the story in itself. Due to the influx of T20 cricket, he proves to be a wicket taking bowler only when the batsmen try to attack him and not when they know they can defend him to oblivion.

Again the question is not whether they have the talent or not, of course Shaun Marsh, Rahul Sharma and the likes of Paul Valthaty, Kieron Pollard, Murali Vijay are all good players, after all it’s not every day a player can conquer a star studded opposition line up. The question should be, how consistent can they be? Can they do it for three consecutive seasons? How are they faring in their domestic matches? Is it a far cry from their IPL records? And the findings can get quiet disturbing. The IPL in its entirety will resemble a farce. As if the selections were never justified in the first place. Yusuf Pathan, Ravindra Jadeja, Saurabh Tiwary, Sohail Tanvir and Manpreet Gony have all walked down the same lane only to find a dead end. All of them are boys who haven’t grown into men; they have beaten the local goons here and there but have failed in the big fights. This particular case of the false heroes will continue and the numbers will increase, as silent spectators and believers of the game what we can only hope for is the prevalence of sanity. No doubt it will take time but let’s just wish the podu of the whistle doesn’t deafen us out by that time.