Mumbai Masala

The terminatorsOne almost gets a culture shock when viewing sports footage of the pristine past. Those were the days when the bowlers and...

The terminators

One almost gets a culture shock when viewing sports footage of the pristine past. Those were the days when the bowlers and fielders hardly showed any trace of emotion on the field of play. A bowler may have got the great Sir Don Bradman out for duck, but the fielding side just quietly waited for the next batsman to come to the crease.

Contrast that with today8217;s scenario when the bowler and fielders go into a war dance after getting a player with no batting pretensions like Venkatesh Prasad.

This unrestrained show of celebration is best exemplified in football where goal scorers go into ecstasies 8212; leaping on top of each other, doing jigs and scaling fences.

TV has changed the face of sport worldwide. And commercialism has been a contributory factor in changing it from a mere past time.

Telecasts of major sporting events have changed the attitude of sportspersons at every level. Youngsters find it difficult to emulate the skills of their heroes, but they find it relativelyeasier in enacting the histrionics of their role models.

That was evident at a recent tennis tournament in the city where two 12-year-olds went for the kill in a title clash. 8220;Get him. Kill him!,8221; said one of the finalists.

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The opponent, after ignoring it for sometime, decided to contest the verbal volley. 8220;Murder him!8221; he shouted, seemingly pumping himself but leaving no one in doubt about his real intentions.

Not to be left out, the motley crowd of school going kids watching the match also took their positions in the war of words by shouting, 8220;Finish him!,8221; 8220;Assassinate him!8221;, 8220;Terminate him8221;.

Did someone say Indian sportspersons lack killer instincts!

Ten-tatively speaking

A sheet of paper left behind by the National selectors at the Mumbai Cricket Association8217;s conference hall on Sunday created a big flutter among the scribes, who had converged at the same place for the press briefing.

The mysterious8217; paper contained typed and hand-written names of 38 players, includingseven stand-byes. It indicated that the list belonged to probably one of the five selectors. Nothing wrong in it. Only that the list featured ten players of a high-profile outfit. There was more to it. It was reliably learnt that one selector walked out of the meeting and interestingly the ten players belonged to his zone.

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Nobody knows whether the list8217;s presence was by default or design but it certainly provides some cannon fodder for the raging debate on the quota system.

Family business

Birds of the same feather flock together. It was evident to this diarist covering the Greater Mumbai District Association Tournament at the Cricket Club of India last week.

The Patwardhans, Vikrant and Asawari, capped a fine run on Raksha Bandhan Day by winning the men8217;s and women8217;s singles title respectively while brothers Yogesh and Jitesh Padukone won the men8217;s doubles title.

The Patwardhans and the Padukones were not the only families in the racket8217; business. The Swaminathans siblings, Narayan andGirija, made it to the finals in their respective age-groups, where they met with disappointment.

The Kejriwal brothers, Abhishek and Animesh, were less successful.

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It8217;s better that children wield the racket on court than create a racket at home!

No better-halves!

Vivek Gautam is an enigma. The 22-year-old, who rarely plays in tournaments, beat Vikrant Patwardhan in the Greater Mumbai District Association Tournament final last year. But this year, the result was reversed.

Gautam, a Central Railway employee, has almost given up on the sport. The reason? No practice partners, he replies. Most of the quality players have joined the exodus to Bangalore 8212; the abode of India8217;s badminton God Prakash Padukone and his academy.

But despite lack of competitive play, Gautam shows no signs of corrosion on court as he unleashes a wonderful repertoire of shots. The one significant change from last year is that his pony-tail has gone. But when it comes stamina, he is a thoroughbred.

Adding ignoranceto injury

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A not so uncommon tendency among Indian sportspersons is to hide injuries. The latest example is that of Hardeep Kaur whose right hand was injured during a practice session of the women8217;s football camp for the Federation Cup at Khalsa College ground.

Hardeep, a goalkeeper, endured the pain and continued to practice without letting the team doctor know about it.

Meanwhile, the injury kept aggravating. 8220;I thought it was just another injury and some senior players advised me to apply Tiger Balm,8221; Hardeep said. The seriousness of injury was revealed when she finally got her injury X-rayed. The seemingly minor injury was a fracture!

Contributed by Jaideep Marar, Arun Janardhan, Girish Karkera and Kulwinder Singh