Last Sunday (10.02.08) the whole country was in a state of euphoria. India had defeated Australia, in Melbourne, after 22 long years. Print and Electronic media went ‘ga-ga’ over the achievement. They predicted the heralding of a new era- unfolding of a new chapter in the Indian cricket. Young guns, like Rohit Sharma, Ishant Sharma, Sreesanth, and Suresh Raina had arrived. From here Indian cricket would be on the upswing or at least the predictions were to that effect.

Just one week has passed. Yesterday (17.02.08) after India were comprehensively beaten all those predictions looked silly. To be fair, the bowlers had done their part successfully. It was only the big guns of batting line up that failed to deliver. But this is nothing unusual or strange. When the bowling combination clicks, the batsmen let the team down. When the batsmen deliver, bowlers fail to contain the opposition and even steep targets are overtaken.

The basic problem is that the boys have not grown into men. They do not realize the importance of playing at the highest level and the responsibility that goes with it. They can always hide behind the standard excuse of having put in their best effort. It is surprising that almost every corporate position brings with it benefits as well as responsibilities. It is the cricketers who enjoy only the benefits of handsome earnings and mass adulation without any sense of responsibility.

At least 3 batsmen, Gautam Gambir, Yuvraj Singh and Rohit Sharma can be blamed for faulty shot selection. A score of 203 in a none-too-difficult batting pitch was perfectly gettable. You play bad shots and loose the match and come up with some silly excuse. When are they going to learn?

And then what is this logic of persisting with the out-of-form-Yuvraj and sending in Pathan at one down? Agreed, when players are passing through lean patches, they have to be backed up, but that does not mean the team should suffer. Dinesh Kartick has been a traveler throughout the tour. The players do not seem to have done even their basic homework. If they had managed to score 162 they could have at least denied Australia a bonus point. Even that was not to be.

In this backdrop, I personally feel all these noises being made about India being the only serious challenger to Australia, being the second best team in the world makes no sense. New zeland managed to beat a less than full-strength Australia 3-0 just before the Worldcup. Every other team like South Africa and West Indies also manage to put it across Aussies once in a while. It does not reflect any new development. It only proves that even the mighty and powerful have an occasional ‘bad day at the office’.

As far as Indian cricket is concerned, this kind of phenomenon has been witnessed far too often. Beginning from the 70’s, we have upset the apple-cart of the Calypso and the Englishmen once in a while. But we have never been a force to reckon with as has been made out. We managed to tumble the West Indies and win the Worldcup in 1983. We won the World Series cup by inflicting defeat on almost all the teams in 1985. Similarly post 90’s our overseas performance has improved considerably. But these have been one-off performances. The truth is that we have not been successful in going a couple of notches up the ring in international cricket. Our performance has neither been consistent nor have we have been able to substain it over a period of time.

Unless the basic problems are addressed, this is likely to remain this way. There is no stopping the money-minting process of BCCI. The quality of domestic pitches remains substandard. There is no serious talent search. There is Government apathy to sports development. The only thing we are good at is exploiting the craze for cricket amongst the masses. Till such time matches would be played out like this. And articles likes this would be continued to be penned.