Opinion The stars in perspective

So he may not have much patience for Singh’s Mumbai Ranji coach Praveen Amre,who has emphasised — with good reason — the need for the young spin bowler to get in a full season of first-class cricket first.

On the other hand,you could argue,Yuvraj Singh did not have to labour in first-class cricket before finding space in India’s squad for the Twenty20 world championships. The Chandigarh-born batsman had a sudden and bravely fought brush with cancer,and has been out of the game for more than a year. Yuvraj’s old mentor,Sourav Ganguly,for one,couched his reservations about the selection in worry about the strain this induction could put him through.

Harmeet and Unmukt are potential stars we are still getting a measure of — and,in these post-Dravid-post-Laxman times,Yuvraj is a veteran among superstars. Yet the crossroads we see them at reflect a common challenge for selectors,captains and coaches: how do you handle stars? With media coverage of sport increasingly organising itself around individuals,how do managers separate considerations of team interest from calculations of the interest a particular sportsperson draws? In fact,with the commerce of sport dictated by bids for broadcast rights,and the implicit importance of stars,is such a separation even possible? Put another way: how do team sports reckon with the brand value of individuals?

Look at tennis. Mahesh Bhupathi may have been the player common to India’s medal hopes in men’s and mixed doubles at the London Olympics,but he was allowed to get away with upsetting both formations. It took the pathetic aftermath of that spectacle for the All-India Tennis Association to drop Bhupathi and his partner in stubbornness,Rohan Bopanna,from a forthcoming Davis Cup play-off. It is a matter of considerable pride for Indian tennis that its players have tended to punch way above their rankings when playing as a team — recall the brilliant run of the Davis Cup team of the Amritraj brothers and Ramesh Krishnan in the 1980s. And more than the medal-less takeaway for tennis at London,it was that history that Bhupathi and Bopanna upset. And you have to wonder if it was put to them so.

Those who fail to learn from past mistakes are destined to relive them. It was at an Olympics too that Indian hockey had allowed its long and proud tradition to be unsettled by indiscipline. In 1968,factionalism was sought to be papered over with the designation of Prithipal Singh and Gurbux Singh as joint captains — and for the first time since they began competing in hockey at the Olympics in 1928,India failed to make it to the final. In fact,barring the heavily boycotted Moscow Games of 1980,after that strange captaincy India never made the final again.

It is perhaps with good reason that the Davis Cup has provisions for a non-playing captain. Tennis players spend vast stretches of their careers competing as individuals,regularly partnering other players in doubles irrespective of nationality,so the temporary unity required in a Davis Cup setting is often better fostered by an authoritative elder who’s not seen to be at odds with those he leads.

But even in an age when every batsman counts in competitive cricket,there may be takers among struggling teams for a particular strategist as extra baggage in their playing eleven: Mike Brearley. I exaggerate,but only just. He is all of 70 years old,but his track record in remaking the fortunes of the Middlesex county and England Test sides by dint of his captaincy is part of cricket lore. And it is more than worth the while of those in leadership roles in sport today to turn to him for advice.

Introducing an updated edition of his classic The Art of Captaincy,Brearley recounts a psychoanalyst’s study of his work. And this is what he found that she found: “A leader or manager in any field,including sport,has to be able and willing to take in and think about the anxiety of those who work in the team. Sometimes it is a matter of getting to the bottom of an anxiety that has already been covered over. It then has to be conveyed,often subtly,to those in the team that their predicament and anxieties are bearable.” That is,the leader has to rise to the responsibility of “containing anxiety and handing it back in a form that can be thought about”.

It would certainly be useful in hazarding the way to deal with superstars,those in a team as well as those dropped or left out. Teams are made of individuals and a team’s fortunes are written by the collective effort of those on its rolls. Equally,an individual’s career is a sum of her outings in multiple settings. In cricket,for instance,in Tests,ODIs and T20s,but also in the service of national,first-class and club sides. Careers in sport,already relatively short in span,are always fraught with the possibility of being cut shorter by injury or loss of form. Add to that the multiplier effect of stardom in terms of endorsement deals and team contracts,and you can understand the anxiety that accompanies a sportsperson’s aspiration.

We don’t know whether Kevin Pietersen’s anxiety to optimise his chances in the England and IPL calendars,the probable cause of his recent meltdown,was persuasively processed by his coach and captain. We don’t know what inputs Yuvraj has received from his board and his team about the unusual circumstances of his return to the squad. Just as we don’t know how young Harmeet is being engaged on possible concerns that biding one’s time may in fact render one history. Or whether,amidst this hysterical national debate on his attendance,Unmukt’s mentors are counselling perspective. But one point is clear: in this age of anxiety,selectors alone cannot manage talent. Coaches and captains have a larger responsibility cut out for them.

Mini Kapoor is a Delhi-based writer