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How young is young?

So how young is the Indian team, anyway? There are no players under 20. There are less than 4 players under 25. The bulk of the team is aged 26-30. And there are three players over 30, at the least.

Australia in contrast has four or more players under 25. Most players are between 25-28. And the very few over 28 are top line performers, figuring in the upper echelons of the batting and bowling lists.

Most Pakistan players are aged between 23-29. The players over 30 are proven achievers. And Pakistan actually has a few players under 20.

So how young is young? We've been hearing this for a while now: We're a young side. We're still learning. We're inexperienced. Give us time. People need to mature.

One of the many lies being perpetrated, perhaps inadvertently by the skipper and the coach, in Indian cricket is that the Indian cricket team is young.

Not! Compare the observations on the ages of the players in the Indian team with those of the players in the other two teams, and you'll see what I mean.

They say figures never lie. Addendum: honest observations based on true figures also never lie. So draw your own conclusions. Are we a young team? Is our definition of 'young' different from the prevailing norm in world cricket?

It's a bit like Humpty Dumpty. The 'had a big fall' chappie. Talking to Alice shortly before doing his swan dive off that wall, H Dumpty said, "When I use a word, it means exactly what I want it to mean."

We belong to the H Dumpty school of linguistics. We say we are a young team. We are not a young team. We used to be a young team. We are not a settled team, either. We keep seeing new faces in the team. And, sometimes, one can mistake new for young. Unfortunately, new does not mean young. Not even in Humpty Dumpty's lexicon. Inexperienced does not necessarily mean young. Young means, young at heart. Willing to learn. Open to ideas. And with potential that can be moulded, shaped and given direction. Do we have a team with more years in world cricket than players from other teams? Sez who?

Which leads us to another issue that is related to our constant, mistaken, belief that we are a young team and that every non-performance has only one cause. The fact that we are young. (Or, more appropriately, think we are young.) The issue is of course that of having people at the top who can correctly diagnose what's wrong with Indian cricket. Our biggest problem is not experience. Or the lack of it. As Wasim Akram very correctly observed, most of our players have been around for at least two years. Two years is not a short time in international cricket. In two years one should be ready to take the next step. One should have used the time to sharpen one's skills. Learnt the tricks of the trade. Toughened up mentally. Learnt little tricks. And been ready to step in and take the pressure off some of the stars.

Most of our players never seem to take the next step. Which is why they always seem young, raw, green behind the years and unable to handle the pressures of the big stage. They constantly seem young, and with some distance to go. And the sad part is most of our players do have some distance to go before they make the next stage, but are no longer that young. And the sooner the captain, the coach, the selectors and the doctors treating the malaise dogging Indian cricket realize this the better.

Our problem is not that we are a 'young team.' Our problem is that we are not a young team, but play like a bunch of novices. Most of the time. Proof of that being the infuriatingly outstanding performances our team puts up. Once in a blue moon. We can play like pros. But only when we feel like.

Most of our bowlers have had at least a couple of years on the international circuit and yet, haven't learnt to bowl a mean yorker. Our top bowlers have been around for nearly seven to eight years and still don't inspire confidence under pressure. Our long tail, with the same faces, has been a standard feature of our batting order for quite some time now. But none of the tailenders seem to have improved the batting. If anything, our so-called all-rounders have gone and added themselves to the ever-lengthening tail. Our one-day team hasn't changed that much over the last three or four years.

And still, we call ourselves 'young.'

We've been seeing the same faces in circulation for quite a while now. I've seen Jacob Martin before. I've seen Hrishikesh Kanitkar. I've seen Nikhil Chopra. I've seen Debashish Mohanty. And thanks to Kapil and Sachin, I've seen more than I can handle of the rickety 'Rolls Royce with Ambassador engine.' (Well, he certainly breaks down often enough.) Nobody is young. They've all been around. Hey, some of them look old enough to be my dad. Atrocious! Plain atrocious!

Now check out some of the reasons being dished out to explain our performance (what performance!?) Down Under. Somebody asks Sachin whether the captaincy is affecting his batting? (Stupid question. Of course it's affecting his batting. And of course he's going to say no. And of course he's going to have the statistics to back it up. He's Sachin. He's God. He has to overcome everything. He's not going to shirk his responsibility. We're going to have to help him.) So what does Sachin say? Sachin points to the averages. But that's not the point, is it? Sachin, that's not the point.

The whole world can see you aren't batting with the same authority you used to. You can see it. And yet, you point to averages?

Doesn't the intelligent cricketer that Sachin is realise that his batting is less about averages and more about attitude? Shouldn't it be obvious to him that the mental frame in which he goes out to bat as captain is not allowing him to play with the 'authority and aggression' of old. (An authority and aggression that the fragile Indian batting order desperately needs.) That, more often than not, he can't make up his mind whether to play his natural game or hold himself back to bear the burden of being the captain of and only consistently performing batsman in the side?

Can't Kapil, the great bowler that he was, see that indiscipline and lack of perseverance are the two things the Indian bowling attack needs to be taught, made to internalize and apply on a daily basis? Kapil did it day in and day out when he was in the Indian team. Why can't he see what the bowlers need to be taught? Why is he still trying to teach them less important things like a sense of humour? Why is he dishing out explanations like inexperience and youth? Venkatesh Prasad is young? Javagal Srinath has just cut his milk teeth? Kapil knows how long it should take for a good bowler to make a mark on the international scene -- he was doing it when barely out of his teens, and by the time he was Prasad's age or Srinath's, he was rated among the top all-rounders the game has ever seen. He knows what it takes to succeed at the top. He knows some of these boys have talent. He also knows what they lack. Or does he?

Because he and Sachin still say, the problem is we are a young team. A team that needs time to mature. A team with a future. And that we only 'did badly' in Australia.

Hullo? We didn't just do badly. We were exposed. Everything that's wrong with Indian cricket was exposed. But we continue to hear the same old reasons. We see little soul-searching. We see no acute analyses. And certainly no concrete initiatives. Just the 'ghissa-pitta' we are still a young team routine.

The problem with our tour Down Under was not that we were a young team and therefore did badly. The problem with our tour Down Under, and with the way in which we play our cricket in general, lies elsewhere. And the sad part is the people at the top don't seem to know where.

So what can be done?

Take the core of the current Indian team and beat them into shape. And when I say beat them, I meet really give them the lowdown on the meaning of discipline and the need to compete at all times. Kick the temperamentally weak into the dustbins of cricket history. (Men who don't know how to concentrate. Men with no guts. Men who can't learn from their mistakes.) It doesn't matter how young or old they are. If they've been given a fair shot and show signs of mental vacuity, they've got to go. Then, replace them with young minds. Young cricketers who are fearless, who know the winning feeling, who are raring to go and who are knocking on the rickety doors of the Indian team.

Conclusion: If we kick out the deadwood and pick young players who are really 'young', we won't get immediate results. They may, initially, do only marginally better than the current lot. Or may do no better. But at least they'll be really inexperienced, really young, really raw and really on the threshold of the next stage. Not men who've been around for a while and show no signs of improvement. Men who, instead of improving, seem to be losing it. Men repeating the same mistakes. And, above all, men who seem to think the India cap is too easily won. And kept.

Boost is the secret of our synergy

Armchair Expert