Rahul Dravid's T20 career - A fairy tale without a happy ending

With other players finding their form for RCB, the team management thought they didn’t have a place for this Bangalorean, and they didn’t pick him at the second auction. But it was not over yet. Rajasthan picked him. They needed an experienced player to strengthen their batting, and Dravid did exactly that.

He scored the most runs for them in that season, even though the team didn’t have a good season. With Shane Warne signing off after the 4th season, Rajasthan picked Dravid as the captain, to many people’s surprise. They needed someone to find the talent in young players and mentor them and they looked no further than Dravid. Even though RR ended up in 7th position in the 2012 IPL, they had found many talents (Rahane in particular), and the team was in good spirits.

Come 2013, we all saw a different Dravid. ‘The Captain’ Dravid. People had criticized his captaincy at the beginning of the IPL. In the 2013 season, he showed plenty of captaincy masterstrokes.

He brought young players like Sanju Samson into the limelight and he himself scored well too with four fifties in the season. Controversies at the end of the season shook the team’s spirits but Dravid held it together and they qualified for the Champions League by coming third.

CLT20 was his last tournament in competitive cricket. Even though he was not in good touch with the bat, he captained really well and with consecutive 5 wins.

This time he helped RR find a very special talent who was 42 years old – Praveen Tambe. Tambe ended up as the highest wicket taker in the tournament, and not even a single six was hit off his bowling. All the RR wins were not just about individual contributions; everyone had pitched in. If Man of the Match title was awarded for captaincy, Dravid would have got it for every game.

In the final of CLT20, everyone in Mumbai Indians played like they were in the form of their life. RR put up a good fight, but it was just not enough.

Dravid came into bat at number 8, putting the team’s interests ahead like he has done always. By the time he was in, the match was already out of hand and he got out attempting a wild slog. That’s how the cricket career of this gentleman ended.

Then again, we are Dravid fans and we don’t have happy endings. We are used to these circumstances which happened throughout his career.

We don’t have to hope for victories and achievements to happen with Dravid, we can just find pleasure in the artistic square cut/cover drive that he plays and his satisfactory smile. We can never be too happy. But we can be proud. Always.