Cricket must find middle path,scale down mad merry-go-round

For one generation of fans in my country,those who grew up in the 1930s,when India was still under British rule,Bradman represented a cricketing excellence that belonged to somewhere outside England. To a country taking its first steps in Test cricket,that meant something. His success against England at that time was thought of as our personal success. He was striking one for all of us ruled by the common enemy. Or as your country has so poetically called them,the Poms.

He was,primarily,like me,a No.3 batsman. It is a tough,tough job. We’re the ones who make life easier for the kings of batting,the middle order that follows us. Bradman did that with a bit more success and style than I did. He dominated bowling attacks and put bums on seats,if I bat for any length of time I am more likely to bore people to sleep. Still,it is nice to have batted for a long time in a position,whose benchmark is,in fact,the benchmark for batsmanship itself.

One of the things,Bradman said has stayed in my mind. That the finest of athletes had,along with skill,a few more essential qualities: to conduct their life with dignity,with integrity,with courage and modesty. All this he believed,were totally compatible with pride,ambition,determination and competitiveness. Maybe those words should be put up in cricket dressing rooms all over the world.

As all of you know,Don Bradman passed away on February 25,2001,two days before the India v Australia series was to begin in Mumbai. Whenever an important figure in cricket leaves us,cricket’s global community pauses in the midst of contests and debates,to remember what he represented of us,what he stood for and Bradman was the pinnacle. The standard against which all Test batsmen must take guard. The series that followed two days after Bradman’s death later went on to become what many believe was one of the greatest in cricket. It is a series,I’d like to believe,he would have enjoyed following. A fierce contest between bat and ball went down to the final session of the final day of the final Test. Between an Australian team who had risen to their most imposing powers and a young Indian team determined to rewrite some chapters of its own history.

The 2001 series contained high-quality cricket from both sides and had a deep impact on the careers of those who played a part in it. The Australians were near unbeatable in the first half of the new decade,both home and away. As others floundered against them,India became the only team that competed with them on even terms. India kept answering questions put to them by the Australians and asking a few themselves. The quality demanded of those contests,sometimes acrimonious,sometimes uplifting,made us,the Indian team,grow and rise. As individuals,we were asked to play to the absolute outer limits of our capabilities and we often extended them.

Now,whenever India and Australia meet,there is expectation and anticipation – and as we get into the next two months of the Border Gavaskar Trophy,players on both sides will want to deliver their best.

When we toured in 2007-08,I thought it was going to be my last tour of Australia. The Australians thought it was going to be the last time they would be seeing Sachin Tendulkar on their shores. He received warm standing ovations from wonderful crowds all around the country.

Well,like a few,creaking Terminators,we’re back. Older,wiser and I hope improved.

It is often said that cricketers are ambassadors for their country; when there’s a match to be won,sometimes we think that is an unreasonable demand. After all,what would career diplomats do if the result of a Test series depended on them,say,walking? But,as ties between India and Australia have strengthened and our contests have become more frequent,we realise that as Indian players,we stand for a vast,varied,often unfathomable and endlessly fascinating country.

At the moment,to much of the outside world,Indian cricket represents only two things — money and power. Yes,that aspect of Indian cricket is a part of the whole,but it is not the complete picture. As a player,as a proud and privileged member of the Indian cricket team,I want to say that,this one-dimensional,often cliched image relentlessly repeated,is not what Indian cricket is really all about.

As I stand here today,it is important for me to bring Indian cricket and its own remarkable story to you. I believe it is very necessary that cricketing nations try to find out about each other,try to understand each other and the different role cricket plays in different countries,because ours is,eventually,a very small world. In India,cricket is a buzzing,humming,living entity going through a most remarkable time,like no other in our cricketing history.

In this last decade,the Indian team represents more than ever before,the country we come from — of people from vastly different cultures,who speak different languages,follow different religions,belong to all classes of society.

I went around our dressing room to work out how many languages could be spoken in there and the number I have arrived at is: 15 including Shona and Akrikaans. Most foreign captains,I think,would baulk at the idea. But,when I led India,I enjoyed it,I marvelled at the range of difference and the ability of people from so many different backgrounds to share a dressing room,to accept,accomodate and respect that difference.

In a world growing more insular,that is a precious quality to acquire,because it stays for life and helps you understand people better,understand the significance of the other.

Let me tell you one of my favourite stories from my under-19 days,when the India under-19 team played a match against the New Zealand junior team.

We had two bowlers in the team,one from the north Indian state of Uttar Pradesh — he spoke only Hindi,which is usually a link language for players from all over India,ahead even of English. It should have been alright,except the other bowler came from Kerala,in the deep south,and he spoke only the state’s regional language,Malayalam. Now even that should have been okay as they were both bowlers and could bowl simultaneous spells.

Yet in one game,they happened to come together at the crease. In the dressing room,we were in splits,wondering how they were going to manage the business of a partnership,calling for runs or sharing the strike. Neither man could understand a word of what the other was saying and they were batting together. This could only happen in Indian cricket. Except that these two guys came up with a 100-run partnership. Their common language was cricket and that worked out just fine.

Beyond the Million Dollar Deals

The everyday richness of Indian cricket lies right there,not in the news you hear about million-dollar deals and television rights. When I look back over the 25 years I’ve spent in cricket,I realise two things. First,rather alarmingly,that I am the oldest man in the game,older to even Sachin by three months. More importantly,I realise that Indian cricket actually reflects our country’s own growth story during this time.

Cricket is so much a part of our national fabric that as India – its economy,society and popular culture — transformed itself,so did our most-loved sport. As players we are appreciative beneficiaries of the financial strength of Indian cricket,but we are more than just mascots of that economic power.

The caricature often made of Indian cricket and its cricketers in the rest of the world is that we are pampered superstars. Overpaid,underworked,treated like a cross between royalty and rock stars. Yes,the Indian team has an enormous,emotional following and we do need security when we get around the country as a group. It is also where we make it a point to always try and conduct ourself with composure and dignity. On tour,I must point out,we don’t attack fans or do drugs or get into drunken theatrics. And at home,despite what some of you may have heard,we don’t live in mansions with swimming pools. The news about the money may well overpower all else,but along with it,our cricket is full of stories the outside world does not see.

Television rights generated around Indian cricket,are much talked about. Let me tell you what the television — around those much sought-after rights – has done to our game.

A sport that was largely played and patronised by princes and businessmen in traditional urban centres,cities like Bombay,Bangalore,Chennai,Baroda,Hyderabad,Delhi — has begun to pull in cricketers from everywhere.

As the earnings from Indian cricket have grown,in the past two decades,mainly through television,the BCCI has spread revenues to various pockets in the country and improved where we play. The field is now spread wider than it ever has been,the ground covered by Indian cricket,has shifted.

Twenty-seven teams compete in our national championship — the Ranji Trophy. Last season,Rajasthan,a state best known for it’s palaces ,fortresses and tourism won the Ranji Trophy title for the first time in it’s history .The national one-day championship also had a first time winner,in the newly formed state of Jharkand where our captain MS Dhoni comes from.

The growth and scale of cricket on our television was the engine of this population shift. Like Bradman was the boy from Bowral,a stream of Indian cricketers now come from what you could call India’s outback.

After India won the World Cup this year,our players were not congratulated as much as they were thanked by people they ran into. “You have given us everything” they were told,“all of us have won” Cricket in India now stands not just for sport,but possibility,hope,opportunities. This is the time Indian cricket should be flowering; we are the world champions in the short game,and over the space of the next 12 months should be involved in a tight contest with Australia,South Africa and England to determine which one of us are the world’s strongest Test team.

Yet I believe this is also a time for introspection within our game,not only in India,but all over the world. We have been given some alerts and responding to them quickly is the smart thing to do. I was surprised a few months ago to see the lack of crowds in an ODI series featuring India. By that I don’t mean the lack of full houses,I think it was the sight of empty stands I found somewhat alarming. India played its first one-day international at home in November 1981 when I was nine. Between then and now India have played 227 ODIs at home; the October five-match series against England,was the first time that the grounds have not been full for an ODI featuring the Indian team.

It is not the numbers Test players need,it is the atmosphere of a Test that every player wants to revel in and draw energy from; my first reaction to the lack of crowds for cricket was that there had been a lot of cricket and so perhaps,a certain amount of spectator-fatigue.

That is too simplistic a view; it’s the easy thing to say but might not be the only thing. The India v England ODI series had no context,because the two countries had played each other in four Tests and five ODIs just a few weeks before. When India and the West Indies played ODIs a month afer that,the grounds were full but this time matches were played in smaller venues that didn’t host too much international cricket.

Maybe our clues are all there and we must remain vigilant. Unlike Australia or England,Indian cricket has never had to compete with other sports for a share of revenues,mindspace or crowd attendance at international matches.

The lack of crowds may not directly impact on revenues or how important the sport is to Indians,but we do need to accept that there has definitely been a change in temperature over,I think,the last two years. Whatever the reasons are — maybe it is too much cricket or too little by way of comfort for spectators. The fan has sent us a message and we must listen. This is not mere sentimentality. Empty stands do not make for good television. Bad television can lead to a fall in ratings,the fall in ratings will be felt by media planners and advertisers’ looking elsewhere. If that happens,it is hard to see television rights around cricket being as sought after as they have always been in the last 15 years. And where does that leave everyone?

Wanted: A Clear Road Map

One of the biggest challenges that the game must respond today,I believe,is charting out a clear roadmap for the three formats. We now realise that the sport’s three formats cannot be played in equal numbers — that will only throw scheduling and the true development of players completely off gear. There is a place for all three formats. These three versions require different skills,skills that have evolved,grown,changed over the last four decades,one impacting on the other. Test cricket is the gold standard,it is the form the players want to play. The 50-over game is the one that had kept cricket’s revenues alive for more than three decades now. Twenty20 has come upon us and it is the format people,the fans want to see. Cricket must find a middle path,it must scale down this mad merry-go-round that teams and players find themselves in: heading off for two-Test tours and seven-match ODI series with a few Twenty20s thrown in.

Test cricket deserves to be protected,it is what the world’s best know they will to be judged by. People may not be able to turn up to watch Test cricket but everyone follows the scores. We may not fill 65,000 capacity stadiums for Test matches,but we must actively fight to get as many as we can in,to create a Test match environment that the players and the fans feed off. For that,we have got to play Test cricket that people can watch. I don’t think day-night Tests or a Test championship should be dismissed.

Embrace Day-Night Tests

In March of last year I played a day-night first-class game in Abu Dhabi for the MCC – and my experience from that was that day-night Tests is an idea seriously worth exploring. There may be some challenges in places where there is dew but the visibility and durability of the pink cricket ball was not an issue.

Similarly,a Test championship with every team and player driving themselves to be winners of a sought after title seems like it would have a context to every game. We will often get told that Test matches don’t make financial sense,but no one ever fell love with Test cricket because they wanted to be a businessman. Not everything of value comes at a price. There is a proposal doing the rounds,about scrapping the 50-over game completely . I am not sure I agree with that — I certainly know that the 50-over game helped us innovate strokes in our batting which we were then able to take into Test matches.

We all know that the 50-over game has been responsible for improving fielding standards all over the world. The future may well lie in playing one-day internationals centered around ICC events,like the Champions Trophy and the World Cups. This would ensure that all 50-over matches would build up for those tournaments.

That will cut back the number of one-day internationals played every year but at least those matches will have a context. Since about,I think 1985,people have been saying that there is too much meaningless one-day cricket.

Maybe it’s finally time to do something about it.

(Excerpts from Rahul Dravid’s speech at the Bradman Oration at the War Memorial in Canberra)