Of Cricket, and Other Games!

[When I posted “Of Cricket, and Simians”, our friend Ekantapadhika (http://nadirafromkannur.rediffiland.com) commented that she couldn’t understand why cricket got all the fanfare, adding that other games got a step-motherly treatment. I replied to her by e-mail my thoughts on the matter. The good lady recommended that I should post the same on Rediff. That’s how “Of Cricket, and Other Games” hit the iLand today! I know I am in for brickbats, especially in the wake of the IPL windfall: yet, here I go].

Well, I am a great cricket fan, though I tend to share, at least in some measure, the view of many friends that cricket has taken the zing out of several other games.

Yet, I have a different take on the matter. Like a true Malayali, I have been following Indian sports for several decades - as long as I can remember. And I try to keep myself updated on every game, whether India plays it or not – may be a typical Malayali attribute.

If we look back, India had just one game where we were world champions - and that was hockey, except for billiards and snooker once in a while. The whole nation took pride in our hockey heroes while our Wilson Jones and Michael Ferreiras and Geet Sethis, all world champions, didn’t receive the kudos that was due to them. There was virtually no other game where we were even of Asian standards, barring may be kho kho or kabbaddi.

In those days, cricket was just another game we played in colonial spirit, a few big names here and there; we lost most matches - a win was a rarity, and naturally no one bothered about cricket. In fact, Ramanathan Krishnan whose exploits on the tennis grounds were widely reported was more of a household name than Nari Contractor or Bapu Nadkarni.

The late 1960s, precisely the 1968 Mexico Olympics, saw the beginning of the end of Indian hockey. We lost to New Zealand in the preliminary rounds and we never hit the podium after that for long. We never had another Ramanathan Krishnan – Premjit Lal and Jaideep Mukherjee held the flag for sometime - till the mid 1970s when Vijay and Anand Amritraj came onto the tennis courts. Prakash Padukone did us proud by winning the All England Badminton Championship. Football was played with great gusto but we hardly won even an Asian medal (it is another matter that we lost in the semi-finals at the 1956 Melbourne Olympics!); athletics was a certain no-no; basket ball, volley ball, name any game, and we were nowhere...
It was at this time that we cobbled up a cricket team which slowly but surely climbed uphill; this period also saw the rise of the famous spin quartet, Sunny Gavaskar, Gundappa Viswanath and some other world class players. And then we did the unthinkable by beating the best in their own backyards – the West Indies in the Caribbean, England in England, and most leading teams of the time in their country pitches.

So, the rise of cricket coincided with the decline of hockey; and I am sure most sports enthusiasts will agree that the fall of Indian hockey had nothing to do with the rise of Indian cricket. In a country where we had no champions, suddenly people started noticing a team of world-beaters - and who wouldn't like to worship the rising son - after all, we Indians are known for that!

It also happened that in the process cricket established itself in our country and many more world-class players came on stage, including the famous Kapil's Devils. Coincidentally, around the same time, Indian hockey started declining further. It helped cricket that suddenly, sponsorship came in a big way into Indian sports - and not just cricket alone. After all, which businessman would like to invest money in a game that was going downhill? It was small wonder then that money went into cricket and not hockey or any other game. Consequently, more and more youngsters started playing cricket, and more and more money got pumped in.

It is also interesting that no other game threw up any big names during this period, except for an occasional PT Usha in athletics, a Prakash Padukone in badminton, a Geet Sethi in Billiards, or an Ashok Kumar in hockey. It is equally important to bear in mind that whenever someone came up world class, he or she didn’t have a problem with sponsorships or coaching facilities. Take the case of Viswanathan Anand: he doesn’t have any problem getting sponsors; his victories are hailed by the whole nation and a large number of Indians are now winning chess championships around the world. Narayan Karthikeyan too found sponsors and here too exciting opportunities are opening up with Vijay Mallya and others entering the scene.

PT Usha and others led to a great revival of athletics in India in general and in Kerala in particular. Several billiards and snooker champions too came up over the years. Ramesh Krishnan, and later Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi revived a national interest in tennis, and the best example is that of Sania Mirza: how much the nation - and sponsors - adore her! We had our shooters and weight lifters who too didn’t find much difficulty in getting sponsorships. But we also know, when money came, problems too arrived: see the infighting in Indian tennis!

To be fair to cricketers, pray, tell me, how many other games have thrown up a Gavaskar or a Kapil Dev or a Tendulkar, and the production line is still very active. Take the case of Sachin alone: I choke with feeling when the nearly one lakh spectators at the cavernous Melbourne Cricket Ground give him a standing ovation as he walks in to bat: even if he goes out for a single, they still give him that standing ovation, to a man! And this was repeated at every stadium in Australia where Tendulkar has played. It is not restricted to the Aussies who are otherwise one of the most jingoistic spectators: from Adelaide to Antigua, Chepauk to Christchurch, Multan to Manchester, the Wanderers to Wellington, this little Indian has brought glory to the game – and to the nation. Not many other players or sportspersons have epitomized the determination to excel as this one Tendulkar.

Look at it from another angle: time was, and still is, when every middle class parent wanted the ward to be a doctor or an engineer - and nothing else. IT came in the way to a small extent, but most families still want doctors and engineers - only. No one wants to go to the armed forces, sciences, humanities, etc. etc. So, as a rule, we all rush in where the money is; it's human, to be fair.

So, I wouldn't hold cricket entirely responsible for our non-performance in other games; it has largely to do with our inclination to identify with a game where we are undoubtedly world class and where we have some players who are world-beaters - even if cricket is played only in seven and a half countries. Money goes with winners, not just in games, or in India alone, but everywhere. Those who doubt, check out the British, Spanish, Italian, German and French football league contracts.  

And the media too is to share the blame, if I may argue so. I agree that while our cricketers need to be felicitated, it shouldn’t become a national hobby to gloat over our few wins, however great they might be, while glossing over our many defeats. See the headlines of our national dailies when India wins a match! As opinion leaders, the media has to be just and balanced, but then the media realizes that cricket wins - and sells!

The malaise runs much deeper than that. It comes with the administration of sports and games in our country and the bureaucratic approach to professional management. Politicians who have never entered the sporting arena except to give away awards or rake in the moolah administer every game worth its name. As long as politicians manage games in our country, we cannot expect world-beaters emerging from India. Viswanathan Anand, Usha, Sania, Paes, Bhupathi and others came to excel on the world stage, in spite of the rot that pervades the system. The same holds true of the Kapil Devs and the Pathans and the Dhonis...

I wrote this just before the `auctioning’ of Indian cricketers! Ekantapadhika wrote to me soon after receiving my e-mail that she still felt cricket is, all said and done, an overestimated game’; after seeing the prices at which guys got auctioned, I tend to agree with her! The perils are worth watching: the original owners of the Kerry Packer circus that led to the introduction of the one-day internationals – the Australians – are a worried lot. They have already issued a warning to their players that their life may be in danger in terrorist-infested India! But the lure of the lucre is too tempting, I guess. The English are also a worried lot: the ECB no more holds the reins of power, you see. So the Aussies and the Brits are now playing to the gallery, suggesting that the kind of money that the BCCI is amassing will tilt the balance of power in the cricket arena: as long as they held the reins, everything was hunky-dory; now, how can we trust the Indians! Strange logic, ain’t it!

I agree, as I said initially, that the rise of cricket has dwarfed the other games; the advent of IPL and the obscene auctioning of players are going to aggravate the problem, no doubt: but to blame the willow and its wielders entirely for our under par performance in other games may not be cricket! It may not be out of place to quote John Kennedy here: `victory begets many fathers, defeat is an orphan.’