Why Sodhi or Robin; why not Sodhi and Robin?

Ranganathan Sriram

A little boy once had one rupee and he needed another to buy himself a cricket ball (Okay, I know no cricket ball costs Rs. 2, so don't blast me, you people), so he could practice his cricket and play for India. So he looked towards God and asked for one more rupee. God heard his call and being such a nice chap, decided to give him a shiny new one rupee coin. Now that the shiny new coin was in the little boy's hands, the one rupee coin he had before began to look old and dull. So the little boy decided to throw away the old coin. You know what he was left with? Still one rupee less to buy the ball he so wanted.

The little boy was tender in years and got blinded by the shiny new coin. What happened to the wise men of Indian cricket, who time and again sit down to select the cricket team and make decisions which confound all of us who understand and love cricket?

They dropped Robin from the one-day team? How could they do it? Didn't they want allrounders in the team? Didn't we all? Haven't we all been praying for all rounders? I have, for one.

So the moment the selectors get shiny, new and talented Reetinder Sodhi, they decide to drop old and dull Robin. Huh? I didn't get that one. What made the selectors think that one allrounder should be replaced with another? Did they ever think both could play together? In the process, give us what we want and that is a couple of good all rounders in the team.

Don't get me wrong here. I am not at all against Sodhi in the team. I along with all other cricket lovers welcome Sodhi with open arms and hope that we can finally stop hoping and wishing for genuine allrounders even slightly in the Kapil mode. I hope he hits McGrath for a first ball six coming in at the end overs like he hit Venky Prasad for a first ball six in one of the Challenger trophy matches last year. I hope he is a star of the 2003 World Cup in South Africa like he was of the Junior World Cup last year. But where in this script did Robin Singh become redundant?

Robin seems to be a victim of the selectors "promote youngsters" battle cry that was first heard after Jaddu/Azhar were dropped recently. At 37, he is about double the age of Sodhi. So what? What is Robin's job in the team? To come in at number 5 or 6 and push the scoring along as quickly as he can? To bowl some overs and not concede too much? To field well? Well ok, so which out of these three has he not been doing well?

He comes in at number 5 or 6, with not a lot of overs left and with mostly tailenders for company and does a pretty good job. When Ganguly loses the fight against his natural tendency to not bowl Robin, he comes on and does a fairly decent job. Like he demonstrated in Nairobi, he is a pretty athletic fielder, whatever his age might be. So performance cannot be the criteria for chucking him out. What is the criterion then? On second thoughts, maybe this does make sense since performance is almost never a criterion for selecting our teams.

One of Badani/Das/Sriram is going to play in the middle order. They cannot bat at numbers one, two or three. Yuveraj seems to have made position four his own for the present, whatever might happen later. Considering Sodhi at five or six and the wicketkeeper at seven, that leaves either five or six for Sriram/Badani/Das unless the team management chooses to change the opening combination.

Robin can hit harder than any of the other three, run faster (except maybe Sriram, who seems to be pretty quick on his feet) and he can pretty well slog better than the three. That, obviously, in the selectors' minds makes the three better prospects than OLD Robin. After writing all that I have written in this paragraph comparing the said players, even I can see the logic behind this. I can understand it IF I TAKE LEAVE OF MY SENSES. Not unless then. Can u? Let me know, will you?

Das/Sriram are openers and they are being made into middle order batsmen. Some time back we had Laxman, middle order bat who was converted into an opener. The move almost finished his career till he hit those 167 against the Aussies and decided to take the God-sent chance and declared his preference to be a middle order bat in future. If that 167 hadn't come to remind us what a talented player he is, he could have gone on declaring anything he wanted to high heavens and no one would have listened. Are Das/Sriram going to go the same way where one-day are concerned?

Let's blood youngsters and let's get some attitude into the team. No argument about that. But let's do it a bit sensibly. Ever heard of 'Horses for courses'? The wise men obviously haven't. Take someone out because he is not performing. Take him out because he is good but he is involved in fixing. Don't take him out because he is 37 years old. Who says only 23-year-old men/boys make good one-day players? Robin is a prime confirmation to the contrary. Fit youngsters into the team because they make a good fit, not because they are young.

Sure, everyone wants to play for India, maybe for pride, for glory or for money. True, there are plenty of players waiting but they have to wait till there is a place. Creating a space for the sake of creating a space is bad management and that is exactly what has been done.

I am still hopeful that Robin will be back. He is too good and too useful not to. Even if Sodhi clicks, we still need a Robin in the team. We need a Sodhi and a Robin in the team. Don't take out Robin to make place for Sodhi. Let's get that cricket ball we wanted in the beginning of the story. For that we need two rupees, whether shiny new coins or old and dull ones. The value remains the same.

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