Yuvraj Singh's fall from the top

Yuvraj Singh

Yuvraj Singh.

A household name all across India.

This man has been the player of the tournament in the last two World Cups that India has won. Yes, he struggled against Sri Lanka. He also bought a certain amount of negativity to the match when he batted against the West Indies.

We celebrated when he hit six sixes of Broad. We partied hard when he took India to the final of the WC T20 with a blitzkrieg against Australia. He was the toast of the nation.

A little before that, 6 months prior to be precise; he and his team where getting criticism from all corners of the country.

4 years on from that day Yuvraj helped India win the World Cup after 28 years in 2011. He was there to finish it off. 3 years since that day, and we’re back to square one. Yuvraj Singh is being blamed for India’s loss in the T20 WC final, although his contributions were not as drastically game changing as they are being made out to be. 11 of 21 is a poor innings in the T20 format. However it isn’t a game breaking one.

It’s quite shameful to be considered an Indian fan when players are treated like this. Stones are being pelted at Yuvraj’s house and people are calling him all sorts of names. The man has put his heart and soul into every game that he has played. He’s not under firing on purpose. It’s part and parcel of the game. Everyone has a bad tournament once in a while.

He has recovered from cancer. He was suffering from a life threatening disease, and yet he played the tournament of his life and brought the cup back home for Sachin and for all of us.

Yuvraj Singh didn’t deserve this. He never will. He’s done so much to cricket in our country. He’s an icon of the modern game and a hero to all of us. He’s the only player to win all the major ICC tournaments (U-19 WC, T-20 WC, Champions Trophy, 50 over WC).

I’ll agree that I was disappointed, when Yuvraj hogged the strike and didn’t allow Kohli to take the attack to Sri Lanka, but the truth of the matter is Kohli and Dhoni both struggled against Malinga and Kulasekara and we can clearly say beyond reasonable doubt that Yuvraj didn’t cause that to happen, it was just good death over bowling.

Let’s just raise our hats to the Lankans. They were awesome and thoroughly deserved it. Kumar Sangakara and Mahela Jayawardane were going to retire from T20Is. Their fans reacted the same way to the loss in the 50 over WC final and the win in the T20 WC, they celebrated their players and their team for doing so well, irrespective of the result. We won the World Cup for Sachin, they did the same for their senior pros.

All those fans who pelted stones at his house have no right to call themselves ‘fans’, did they build a house for Kohli when he played well? Such fickle minded fans are the reason why I hate using social media after a poor game. People seldom stand up for a player when they perform poorly or under perform.

The players are human as well. Give them respect and don’t insult them. Constructive criticism which is something based on facts is fine, and will probably help the player if he heeds to the advice, as it’ll be based on fact and not opinion. Personal insults and pelting houses is most certainly not.

Maybe Yuvraj needs to call it time on the international arena, but that’s not for us to decide. Give him time. He’ll come good. Yuvraj plays his first game in Bangalore colours for the first time tomorrow and most Yuvraj fans will believe that this could be his comeback tournament.

Yuvraj Singh will be back.

One bad tournament and the whole world forgets who you really are.