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A Viagra for Indian cricket

There are few things as disappointing as a Test-match loss. The norm is that we over-analyse the causes – one, because cricket has such a wide following and two, because we Indians love doing so. Having said that, I cannot resist the temptation of contributing my bit to the analysis.

Most discussions boil down to discussing the team composition, and I will address that in a little while. More important to me, however, is the psychology that most Indian sportsmen bring to the field. Sport is by design competitive, that is why you have winners and losers. Yet, most Indian sportsmen have taken the credo of participation almost to an art level. The cricket team is no exception. An occasional win keeps the fans happy, and personal landmarks brings in the moolah and stardom, so where is the need to build a team that puts winning above everything else?

Winning, as has often been said, is a state of mind. What separates the 100 metre gold-medallist from the silver-medallist, to pick an example, is that fierce desire, the will to stretch bodily limits that extra bit, which squeezes the extra fraction of a second off the running time. Readers in the US will remember Michael Jordan in last year's NBA finals – talent and determination combined to produce that awesome display. How many times have we seen such displays from Indian sportsmen?

The cricket team is a living example of this very Indian malady. Make no mistake, it is an extremely talented team – at least, 6 of the current team would make the team of any of the Test-playing countries. It has an ideal mix of youth and experience (and in some cases, of youth and experience combined). A team from Australia or South Africa or even England with similar talent would be practically unbeatable on any surface. Australia and South Africa have built their successes on far fewer talents, but many more fiercely determined individuals.

Lest one feel tempted to attribute this to cultural reasons, let me add that we, the cricket fans, have contributed to this by demanding too little, too infrequently. Apart from the successes in ODIs in 1983-1985 and the Test victories in 1992-1995, we have hardly ever had a cricket team which has been consistent winners at the international level. But in this same period, cricket has reached incredible heights in popularity, making stars and millionaires of our cricket players. I often wonder why this has happened, and struggle to find a logical answer.

Is it that a nation, starved of success, has latched onto a sport in which we have at least an outside chance of winning? Does it mean that we are just satisfied with having an outside chance, and it doesn't really matter that it hardly ever translates into winning?

The answer to both questions it seems is in the positive. The cricket team, quite aware of this, will hence carry on blithely with inane justifications proffered in post-match interviews. The captain will continue to shrug off his own irresponsible batting – we must not forget that he got the captaincy back after a protracted period of supremely irresponsible batsmanship. A talented team will win once in a while because a brilliant display from one talented individual can win matches sometimes. It will lose more often because, to win consistently, all eleven players must want to win -- and that hasn't been the case with the Indian cricket team for a long time.

The abject performance of the team in Kuala Lumpur was the best example – forget the reasons, the team didn't want to win, and that in sports is a death knell.

Prem Panicker is right about the team composition – there is not much that is wrong with the team with the exception of the opening pair. I would add the absence of a third quality seamer as another flaw. Prasad, in his 1996-'97 form, would have plugged that gap. His sudden decline - and one only hopes it is temporary - is cause for worry. Mohanty has potential – but we will never know how much till we give him a decent run in the playing eleven.

The current composition of the team, however, makes it impossible for a third regular seamer to be played, unless one decides to play only one spinner. With Dravid, Tendulkar, Azharuddin and Ganguly in the middle-order, you either play Nayan Mongia in the opening slot (with a regular opening batsman) or play with four bowlers, two regular openers and Mongia in a middle-slot.

Quite a difficult decision actually. While Ganguly can chip in with some overs, he is not a test-level bowler. Any combination of 4 bowlers (Srinath/ Agarkar/ Kumble/ Harbhajan or Srinath/ Agarkar/ Kumble/ Mohanty) is going to be weak for a Test match. The root of the problem is that the ideal Test team should have 3 middle-order batsmen and we have 4. This translates into difficult choices:

Get two specialist openers into the team (in place of Sidhu and Robin Singh from the team that played Zimbabwe). Problem: only 4 bowlers. Get two specialist openers and keep 5 bowlers. Problem: Need to drop one of the middle-order batsmen. To suggest any one of Dravid, Tendulkar, Azharuddin or Ganguly is one, not good cricketing sense and two, an invitation for lynching at the hands of their numerous fans. Get one specialist opener and 5 bowlers. Problem: Mongia or someone who is not a specialist opener (we have had Dravid, Ganguly, even Tendulkar mentioned as possible openers in the past) will have to open the innings. The team has clearly opted for the third option, which really seems to be the only way to go.

Not ideal, but who said that this is an ideal world.

Now, only if we could find a Viagra-type pill which builds a will to win, the results could be very different.

Prem Panicker adds: Shalabh Kumar contributes the occasional freelance piece for Rediff. This one, like his previous offerings, is very well-reasoned.

By way of taking the debate further, this much: One way to think this through would be to look at the ideal scenario, then figure out how to get there. And the ideal scenario would have India winning Test matches, with some degree of consistency, abroad.

To do that, a team requires bowling strength -- that, too, is a given.

So what makes the ideal bowling lineup you would care to take into a Test match? For my money, among available choices (this could be reviewed as and when new talents make an appearance), the preferred lineup would be two opening bowlers, a support seamer, and two spinners. Srinath, Kumble and Agarkar suggest themselves as obvious picks. In the 14, the other players one would like to see are Prasad (given that he returns to full form and fitness -- failing that, Mohanty), Harbajan and Sunil Joshi.

Thus, depending on track conditions, the combo would either have the third seamer, or three spinners in Harbajan, Joshi and Kumble supporting the two opening bowlers. And if the third seamer is being used, then the choice between Harbajan and Joshi would be made on the basis of the kind of batting the opposing side has -- I mean, it doesn't take a mastermind to figure that an offie would be picked ahead of the left arm spinner if facing a team like the West Indies, with a plethora of left-handers in the line up.

Five regular bowlers, however, are pretty much mandatory, since none of the first four are the kind to consistently run through sides. And a wicket-keeper, in the middle order -- no matter what the considerations, I personally believe that asking a guy to do squats for a day and a bit and then go out and open the batting is inviting the early breakthrough.

So that makes six, and leaves just five batting slots to fill. And it is the opening slot that most demands attention -- and at this point, I would suggest that you can't do a Thomas Alva Edison, trying out every single player who has opened at the first class level, rather in the manner of Edison trying out 1000 filaments to find the right one for the light bulb.

Right now, none of the players in the domestic circuit appear to have what it takes to slip easily into the opening slot at the highest level. Therefore, the only option available is to shuffle the existing batting order, to fill that vacuum. And for the number one slot, I can think of no better candidate than Saurav Ganguly.

For starters, he is wasted at 5 or 6. As to the 'can he do it' question, I recall the same query being asked when it was first suggested that he open in the ODIs. Technically and temperamentally, he has what it takes to do the job. Then there is the oft-touted argument that it is easy enough to tuck him up by going round the wicket and angling the ball in at him, denying him driving width.

So? We are talking Test cricket here -- Ganguly does not need to get a couple of fours every over, so that particular angle doesn't become the problem it could be in the ODIs. And in the past, he has demonstrated time and again that he has the patience required to hang in there when runs are hard to find.

With Ganguly at one, the number two slot remains to be fixed. On this site, we have in the past argued a case for Sachin Tendulkar to be promoted to that position -- and the arguments still hold good. However, there is a considerable body of opinion that holds that it is unwisdom to risk Sachin that early in the innings (funny, isn't that what we are doing in ODIs? Besides, would that view imply that Sachin -- being touted by all and sundry as the world's best -- needs mollycoddling, needs a Praetorian guard around him to keep out the big bad fast bowler?).

However, if that opinion is to be accepted, if Sachin is indeed to be cushioned, then India could do a lot worse than put Laxman into the opening slot. Neither his technique, nor his temperament, is in question -- he did enough, during the tour of the West Indies, to merit a longer run at the top. What is in question is his confidence to do the job -- and that confidence can come from the knowledge that the job is his to do, that he is not going to be bumped back down the order -- or worse, entirely out of the side -- for the next game.

Laxman and Ganguly at the top, then. Followed by Dravid at three, which is his ideal slot for him. With Sachin coming in at four. And -- at least for the immediate future, though the jury is still out on his continued tenure -- Azharuddin at five with Mongia following.

Hell, I look at that lineup and I can think of several sides that do more, in terms of results, with less in terms of talent. Five top batsmen, a keeper who can bat, three (with Joshi, make that four) bowlers who can bat (and who should be told by the team management that each time they get out under double digits, they will be fined).

That lineup appears to have a settled look to it -- but then, maybe Shalabh has a point, maybe the Indian team also requires cricket's equivalent of Viagra. Having talent is not enough -- winning has to become their biggest aphrodisiac.

Then again, maybe we are missing something. Maybe there are other options, other ways of tackling the problem. If so, tell us about it -- on Discussion Group, which after a short hiatus owing to technical problems, revives today.