The Sachin Conundrum

When is a good time to talk about Sachin Tendulkar? Any time in the last 23 years. So lets talk Sachin.

I can already hear the voices in your head. Another puny blogger trying to write the customary "Sachin: The God of cricket" tribute piece, trying to show that he has arrived? Or trying to sell himself as a thinking writer by picturing him as the root all evil, as a symbol of consumerist India? If I can express myself well enough though  then this blog should not fall into either category, and no I am not trying to be a smart ass by saying I will try to take the middle path, show the bigger picture. This is just an attempt to look back at the Sachin I have known through the years. It has been a long marriage which has lasted 23 years and still going strong. It has seen some awesome and some rough times <insert roller coaster ride cliché>. There was the honeymoon period when the young Sachin arrived. A look at him and you knew this was a virgin. He gave us batting orgasms every time he walked in. Every other country looked at him with wishful eyes, hoping he was their own and you would feel proud everytime just to think he can never be their's. Truly world's envy, India's pride. In the word's of Kung Fu Panda, "Never before in the history of Kung Fu a man was so loved, and so feared".

So often when we are talking about Sachin, we are not really talking about Sachin the human. No, not Sachin the God either. A critique on Sachin is essentially a critique on the Sachin phenomenon. I am conscious of this fact while writing this, and normally a criticism of Sachin here will be a criticism of Sachin the phenomenon and not Sachin the person.

A Hero is born.

The time is late 90s. India is coming off age. Well at least the middle class is. We have satellite TV channels beaming 24 hour entertainment to millions. And there is a desperate need for a hero. But who can this hero be? For batman fans, "A hero we don't deserve yet, but need desperately". Although we definitely are on the rise as a nation, we are hardly standing on our feet yet. We are not the best at anything. Except - We have the best batsman in the world. There shouldn't be any doubt about this. He is the best batsman ever, period. Anyone trying to argue on that doesn't know shit about batting and cricket. Even Don Bradman agrees that Sachin is the only batsman who plays like him. Thousands of newspaper pages are dedicated to singing his praise, hours and hours of television programming to celebrate his greatness. All of this Sachin totally deserved. A middle class boy from Mumbai with immense talent but who has also worked extremely hard to reach where he is. Sunil Gavaskar could have been that hero too, but he played at a time when the junta were more worried about Roti, Kapda, Makaan than sporting icons. Sachin arrived just at the perfect time. At the fag end of the milleniom the news media is now learning to delve into borderline absurd. I can't recall how many times the news channels repeated the line about Sachin coming in Shane Warne's dream. Yes, Warne had said this just in a manner of speaking while giving an interview and he later clarified that it wasn't as if Sachin was actually giving him nightmares. But our news channels picked it up verbatim and repeated it a zillion times till it became permanent in the brain of every Indian cricket fan.

The moment of truth.

The time is early 2000s. Sachin is the only person in the country who is beyond questioning in media. You can criticize beliefs, practices, leaders, businessmen, sportsman, anyone you want, but criticizing Sachin is committing hare-kiri for a news channel. That seems fair too. Sachin has been the best cricketer in the world for a long time and he seems totally immune to any corrupt influences that may him sway him into anything controversial. Some one took a plunge then it seems. I don't know when it began. But a guess would be the Ferrari car incidence. He may have been criticized before, but that was the first time I saw the collective voice of many news channels speaking against Sachin. It was totally and utterly absurd. Heck I even saw Sachin effigies burnt on news channel. Some people rallying on the road with a katora to collect money for Sachin to pay the customs duty, yes a hindi news channel showed this on TV. The Fiat people came in and paid the customs to stop things from getting ugly. But the dam was already broken. One of India's first Peepli Live was played on news channels for days. The media had realized that a criticism of Sachin can work too, probably work even better than unending praise which the people were bored of anyhow.

The Present.

Yes that's a long jump in the timeline, but I know you don't have the patience for a history lesson and there is not a thing about the Sachin story that you the reader of even this obscure cricket blog don't know yet. Sachin has dominated the game for 20 years. No sportsman, heck no individual has been at the top of his business consistently for so long. Even Steve Jobs had a nearly bankrupt Apple and a failed Next on his way. Many greats rise and fall. Sachin the batsman could only rise. Breaking records for him has become absurd now. I dearly wish the media could stop harping about some of the pseudo records that Sachin has made and is on the verge of making. But how can they, even now a piece on Sachin sells better than most other things. Apart from praising Sachin, people now openly criticize him as well. A middle class which mostly celebrates capitalism and corporate greed has been accusing Sachin of being selfish. The fans and devotees will still call it just Sachin's hunger. Well it may be hunger or greed, but is it really Sachin's fault? Haven't we all collectively pushed him to be this hungry? Most fans want him to score a hundred even if India loses. There are brands whose quarterly results may be a function of how many hundreds Sachin is scoring. 

So, is Sachin bigger than cricket then in this country? You Bet. Our chief selector openly declared that this man can play ODIs for as long as he wants while at the same time easily suggesting Laxman to walk away from test cricket. A man who dares to drop Sachin from the team would need Z+ security the very next day. Of course Sachin can choose when he wants to retire. He can also choose which series he wants to play and what number he wants to bat. Always No. 1 in ODIs and No. 4 in tests irrespective of any calamities that may happen. Is it justified? Probably is. He just wants to stand up and be counted for as long as possible and you can't blame him for that. It's not his job to walk away from something he loves so much and something that has given him greatness and immortality. We have all helped creating the legend. He is and he will be the Sachin Tendulkar. Just continue to bow down and watch until some day when he decides to give you a final bow and bids a final Good Bye. Will he do it as he nears 40? Did the Mayans predict anything for 2012? I hope not...

Any piece on Sachin may get a reaction from the Internet Sachin Militia. If you hate this, kindly refrain from trying to hunt and kill the writer or destroy the server on which this page is hosted. The thoughts are solely of the author and cricketbakchod.com doesn't subscribe to them in part or in total. Any hate messages can be left as comments or sent to rajesh@cricketbakchod.com

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A Very Very Special Friend

There are these 3 cricketers. They are like my friends since I have grown up with them. This post is about one of them.

The time is around 95 - 96, and I have started watching and undestanding cricket. Azhar, Sachin, Kumble were already well into their careers. They all mean a lot to me but these 3 other cricketers are more special. Ganguly, Dravid, Laxman. I have seen their careers start and bloom and now end. (Yes Ganguly made his ODI debut much earlier, don't disturb the stream of thoughts with your nitpickings). I can almost sum my school life, college life and work life as a series of milestone innings these gentlemen played. Laxman is the last one of my really close friends to bid me farewell, and he is the one I am probably not going to see much after this since I can't see him becoming a tv personality after retirement which Ganguly already is and Dravid can easily become. Laxman is like that one nice guy we have known and considered fortunate to be friends with. Unlike his other compatriots, he hardly ever does anything flashy on or off the cricket field. You never see him play a wild shot or a picture of him letting his hair down at a party or as is the norm for all star cricketers in the country, feature in an ad. No, he is just a simple lovable friend with whom you share a lot of fond memories.

My journey with Laxman started in 1996 when I heard that another Hyderabadi who is an Azhar clone is doing great in the Ranji trophy making big scores consistently and will soon be a part of the team. The time came against South Africa in the first test at Ahmedabad. You know India are in trouble when the match is stopped for crowd throwing bottles on the ground. This match had reached that stage. With just Laxman and the tail at the crease and India only 70 runs ahead, the match seemed to be heading for an early end. But VVS wasn't the 2nd innings God and India's greatest ever crisis man by fluke. He had it in his first test match itself, at the age of 22. He strung together crucial partnerships with Joshi, Kumble and Srinath to give India something to play for with a lead of 170. Srinath then famously destroyed the South African batting with six wickets for a famous Indian win. Laxman had arrived, or had he? With Ganguly back in the side and an indifferent performance in the 2nd test, Laxman was quickly dropped. This was a formidable Indian middle order and the only way in to the side was through a door which read makeshift openers. Laxman agreed regretfully but never got any real success at that position. His footwork wasn't great against the new ball and I have a lasting image of him in my mind getting out leg before or bowled against a moving ball.

Back in the Ranji trophy, Laxman continued to make an insane amount of runs. In 1999/2000 season he seemed to get a 100 every innings and double, triple hundreds for fun. He scored a highest of 353 and a staggering 1415 runs thats season which is still a Ranji Trophy record. The only reason Hyderabad couldn't win the final against Mumbai that year was Laxman getting run out in the first innings and Hyderabad conceding a first innings lead.

At one point then he took a decision which I honestly felt wasn't a smart one at that time. He refused to open the batting and decided to sit out of the Indian squad until there is a place for him in the middle order. Finally and ironically, his idol Azhar's slot got vacated after the match fixing fiasco and Laxman for the first time after his debut got to bat in the middle order. Words simply don't do justice to that innings against Australia at Kolkata in 2001. It was a batting orgasm which lasted a whole day. Frankly, I am still recovering from that knock till this day. If someone tells me that the innings was a hoax, I might believe him. Laxman was a batting superstar now. His decision to wait for a middle order slot was vindicated. Heck if they aren't already talking about it in a case study in some B-school, then I question the collective intelligence of global academia. He took a risk by letting go of one opportunity and waiting for the next which may have never come. when the opportunity did arrive, he grabbed it with both hands and both legs and continued groping and violating it for 3 sessions until the opportunity was his bitch. Many years later Kumble talked about the long process which lead to India becoming the number 1 test side. This my friends, was the start of that process. India continued to show bouncebackability for the next 10 years and Laxman continued to epitomize this quality.

Numbers can't do justice to Laxman's character and artistry. If numbers were the sole measure of greatness then <Digression start>Salman Khan is easily bigger than Kamal Hasan, Dilip Kumar, Mohanlal and every other great Indian actor combined.<Digression end>. Laxman's record though since his come back to middle order in 2001 is formidable. He averages 49 plus in over a hundred tests. Considering that he so often ran out of partners and had to bat with the tail, the number is quite phenomenal. Though his real value for the team was in refusing to identify an imminent defeat. Tough pitches, great bowlers will continue to get the best out of him. Many a words have been written about his wristy stroke play but they hide the steely grit which was the real mark of Laxman.
And so it ended yesterday, not with a bang but with a whimper. Never a man to hog the limelights, this shy Hyderabadi preferred to quitely walk away like a real Man. No farewells. No good bye. No see you later. Just walking away quitely in to the sunset. Good Bye old friend. I have reason enough to believe that your second innings will always be better than the first one.

Some Very Very Special facts:

• In the era of professionalism in cricket, Laxman just focused on his batting and didn't have a player agent.
• Do a google image search for VVS Laxman, look at his bat. Anything peculiar? The bat only has the bat makers name. Unlike most other Indian batsmen, VVS very seldom had a bat sponsor!
• Laxman's parents were doctors, they obviously either had him genetically mutated, or replaced his wrists with rubber at an early age.

- rajesh@cricketbakchod.com 

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