Careless whispers

Yogesh Upadhyaya

Forget the second opening batsman, forget the tearaway fast bowler, even forget the batsmen who live up to their billing. The one thing Indian fans should fervently be wishing for is Sachin Tendulkar and Sourav Ganguly regularly and openly communicating with each other.

Consider the facts. Tendulkar is definitely among the top three batsmen in the world in both forms of the game. We can argue for hours about how, if he had been around to ensure the 16 runs required for victory against Pakistan, he would have been THE greatest batsman in the world. What is unarguable is that he can be counted among the top three.

Ganguly on the other hand is clearly a successful captain and, at least, a competent international batsman. Five victories and one draw out of eight Tests, and 21 victories from 39 one-day internationals played as a captain would make him a successful captain; wouldn't it? There is also the fact, that along with Rahul Dravid, these two gentlemen are the only players in the Indian team who can be sure of their places in the medium term. At the same time, all three have been in the team long enough, which makes money go low down in their list of priorities. The three of them can think and act in the long term interests of Indian cricket.

Consider history; Indian cricketing history. It is replete with instances of winning combinations coming to naught because of personality clashes between key individuals. The most famous of these cricketing clashes was that between Sunil Gavaskar and Kapil Dev. The point is not whether there was really a clash or whether it was all a figment of the media's imagination. The point is that an analysis of the performance of the two gentlemen during the "clash days" was focused on whether one deliberately performed badly to make the other look bad as a captain. That would have helped neither of them.

Shades of Gavaskar/Kapil in Tendulkar/Ganguly?

It all started when Ganguly made a statement, which implied that his centuries have led to victories for India more often. Clearly, Ganguly feels that his worth as a batsman, especially a one-day batsman, has not been adequately appreciated. There may be some justice to this feeling. However, Ganguly should realize that his way to history books does not lie through his batting but through his captaincy. And any captain in international cricket would give his arm and leg to get Tendulkar as a batsman and bowler in his team.

Tendulkar did not help matters when he said he has not ruled out considering captaincy again. One may ask: where was the question of ruling out captaincy when the captaincy was not on offer? Tendulkar may think that he was hard done by the selectors and some players when he was the captain. However, he may do well to realize that the shrewd and arrogant Ganguly is probably the best placed in the Indian team for the very crucial task of negotiating with the Board of Control for Cricket in India! His own naivete would cause the same problems that occurred in his first innings as a captain!

Both Sachin and Sourav may well argue that they were misinterpreted by the press. But that is the point isn't it? The press is going to look for stories and intrigues, and statements made "by the way" would be taken out of context to be made into sensational headlines. This would go on and on till one or the other actually starts believing what he reads in the papers. And that would be a pity.

That is why I hope Mr Tendulkar and Mr Ganguly spend enough time communicating openly with each other and then have a good laugh on all that is written about them.

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