Chappell vs. Ganguly

Chappell, Ganguly and We Silly Indians

We Indians are silly. That is one of the main reasons our country is not developing as fast as it should. We are silly because of our wrong priorities. We waste our time over wrong things and spend little time over the right things. We debate unimportant things but find little time to discuss important issues. We do not ask the right questions when confronted with an issue. Instead, we get into pseudo intellectual arguments. We always miss the woods for the trees.

All the above is nothing new. But the hot debate of the day, Greg Chappell vs Saurav Ganguly, has again brought into sharp focus our silly behavior. Some have praised Chappell for the firmness he has shown in dealing with the Indian cricket players who are perceived by many to be spoilt brats. Others have chided him for being insensitive. Many feel it is unfair to sack Ganguly if only because of his wonderful track record as captain till recently. Others feel that Ganguly was never a good captain. He succeeded because he had a good team and plenty of luck. For some newspapers it is front page head line news. For many magazines, it is cover story material. Primetime television shows on a number of reputed channels are discussing the issue for several minutes every day.

The way we are discussing the whole episode only underscores how poor we are in critically examining issues. Whether Chappell or Ganguly is right is clearly not the right question to ask. A rational analysis will quickly reveal that both Chappell and Ganguly are irrelevant. Chappell is not worth the money he is being paid. However, great a cricketer he may have been, however, great his coaching skills, there is little he can do to change the situation. Ganguly may be more successful than most other Indian captains. But compared to Clive Lloyd, Ian Chappell or Steve Waugh, he pales into insignificance. His only real claim to uniqueness is throwing off his T Shirt, after India won a match against England!

Our cricketing fraternity has tried to distort the picture beyond imagination to make it look as if our cricket team is good. Which is why in recent times, we have been hearing statements like “This is one of the best teams in the history of Indian cricket,” “India has entered so many finals. But it is inexplicable why they are not winning most of them” and so on. The fact is our cricket team at no point in the history of the game has come close to being the world champions. At best, it has been a distant second. If three teams take part, to call the game between the two teams who are better than the third, the final, is nothing but a joke. Indeed, even in full fledged tournaments like the World cup, only seven teams with some standing take part – Australia, England, West Indies, South Africa, New Zealand, India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. The other teams merely make up the numbers. So terms like final give a totally distorted picture. If terms like final do not make sense in a game played by so few countries, then terms like semi final deserve to be banished from the cricketing lexicon.

Compared to cricket, games like football and hockey involve several teams. Getting to the semi final of a football or hockey world cup is a true achievement. Indeed, qualifying for a place in these tournaments is itself a big challenge. These games are also a real test of fitness and stamina. Contrast this with cricket. Most of our players cannot run fast, forget about diving on the ground or throwing the ball to the wicket keeper from the boundary line.

Clearly the issue is not whether Ganguly or Chappell is right or whether Jagmohan Dalmia should be supporting Ganguly. The issue is not whether Yuvraj or Kaif should be playing. The real issue is whether we have the courage to ban cricket in view of the circumstances prevailing. Our cricketers have no accountability whatsoever. Whether they win or lose, they continue to earn pots of money. So do many of our former cricketers as commentators. Meanwhile, because of this game, valuable time is lost and work in offices comes to a standstill for several hours, before, during and after the game. Not only is the game not creating the right role models for our youngsters, but also it is diverting resources from more relevant games like football and hockey.

Instead of debating whether Ganguly or Chappell is right, why don’t we debate: “Is cricket good for India?”