R.I.P Indian cricket!

It was tough, trying to control the tears of anger that were trying to find their way through my eyes. Everything is finally crashing around me; the dream cricket team which I have been following right from the age of three has sunk beneath the troubled waters, not a single rope to tie myself to. The immense pain in my heart as I sat watching MS Dhoni wage a lone (lost) battle was too much to take in. Still like a typical fan I was working out the ways and means in which India could win. Can Dhoni play a whirlwind knock? Can Jadeja live up to his all-rounder tag? Will Ashwin be an able support to take India through? – Every possible solution was running through my mind, even as the batsmen were crumbling under pressure.

My hero, who brought me the World Cup, was still at the crease, and he was the only modicum of hope left for the deteriorating team. He showed us what was lacking in the other players. Players who were ready to hit below the belt for captaincy without worrying about the team, sat watching the game without a hint of remorse or guilt; it infuriated me even more. India was never the best team in the world, but they have always been competitive enough to make the opponents take us seriously. But this isn’t the team that I have been supporting all my life. Except for one or two youngsters and the skipper himself, the others didn’t even show the stomach for a fight or rather they were lacking one.

It was all hunky-dory in the beginning, since Kohli was performing, and couple of seniors were supporting him and all seemed healthy. But everything has its own expiry date and so did Kohli’s form. We were not expecting this quite frankly, and now the form of the ‘famed’ batsmen has been exposed finally. Famed? It was never a famed batting lineup but a lineup which consisted of ‘famed’ players. As a team, they have always lacked the zeal to work together and that has been our shortcoming! Barring Raina, Kohli and Dhoni, the other batsmen had to face the consequences of being complacent in the past – they assured of their place in the side. Actually, that has been the problem with India for quite some time now. Old faces keep popping up time and again and youngsters are introduced only once in a blue moon. If that wasn’t the case, players like Sehwag, Zaheer and Gambhir wouldn’t have been playing in the team for so long. Take Yuvraj for example, what has he done to merit a place in the side? (I mean, he did entertain us with those mammoth sixes in the T20s and the three fours were good to watch, but that is inconsequential). He scored a double hundred in some meaningless Duleep Trophy game, and bang, he is in the Test team. I mean, why show preference to any player? If one double hundred is all it takes to cement a place in the Test side, Amol Muzumdar should have been completing his 100^th Test by now.

But you can’t really blame the BCCI for what is happening. We (read: fans) have a major role to play in these selections. Certain players are retained even after their poor shows because of the large fan-following that they command. You drop a player, his fans will immediately start a campaign against BCCI, the skipper and anyone they could point their finger towards. That has crippled the BCCI from acting against these players, and they carry on unabashed!

There are many demons in Indian cricket, the IPL for example. Indian cricket has such been a slave to the money generated by the IPL that they have failed to think about the hazards that the money brings with it. International players come here once in every year, take a nice look at the conditions and milk us for runs when they come to play here again. A player like David Warner has got two centuries in the IPL, whereas our players are far behind when it comes to numbers. No Indian senior barring Sehwag has got a hundred in IPL. If they win the T20 matches, one can atleast justify the significance of the competition, but India has failed there too, failing to qualify for the semifinals in the last three editions of the world T20.

Players are not bothered about their career, because even if they do not play for India, they can still make the same kind of money playing in the IPL. Therefore, they do not give a damn about Test cricket, or any other form for that matter. If India has to even think about winning, then the IPL should be banned. But don’t hold your breath as it won’t happen; as a genuine fan I feel that IPL has been the platform for failures and not opportunities.

They needn’t bother even if they fail, because they have got the IPL coming, and the money is going to flow in for sure. The worst case is that they will be getting a few hundred thousand less; I mean who cares about it, as long as they are provided for a lifetime? They’d hang up the boots few years later, and wear a coat and sit on the commentary box saying ‘’that bowler should flight the ball more; this batsman should learn to play more straight’’ like we do not know what they did whilst they got the chance.

The Australians are coming here next, and they must be pretty excited and positive about their chances after India has been keeping them at bay for more than seven years. Frankly, I can only see defeat looming as Indian cricket is in a pathetic state and an immediate recovery is not on the cards, seeing how things are. The BCCI is not going to relent; there is not going to be any change of opening combination, no booting of undeserving players, no change in captaincy nor the incompetent bowlers. Zaheer is definitely going to find his way back into the team somehow, and he is going to keep suffering from injuries at crucial junctures and I am sure no one is going to stop him. Harbhajan is no different either; he will pick a couple of five-fors in some useless domestic match, make a comeback and prevent the team from moving forward.

It is extremely sad to see the state of Indian cricket today; all the hard work done by the seniors has gone to waste. It is tough to imagine how they would be feeling right now for trusting this team and retiring peacefully. Yes, we have lost a series against Pakistan many a times in the past, but the manner in which they have outplayed us, beat us till we bled, has hurt us like a thousand thorns piercing through the heart. I fail to put my emotions behind these words, and the pain hasn’t eased even after sharing all my views. Indian cricket is dead in my opinion, and the everlasting hope that India would win the next match has ceased to exist anymore. Unless there are some drastic changes in the institution of Indian cricket, I can safely say that ‘R.I.P Indian cricket!’