Thank You, Prabhash Ji

This piece is a tribute to Prabhash Joshi, who died of cardiac arrest late on November 5, just after watching his favourite cricketer Sachin Tendulkar play the innings of his life in a losing cause. This is also a lament that the space occupied by journalists like Prabhashji, who have the printer’s ink in their veins and the ability to confront ethical dilemmas head on, has contracted further by his passing away.

The extraordinary thing about Prabhashji was that he remained ordinary; rooted to the grassroots and committed to the everyday concerns of the common man. The common man is a much-abused word in today’s media, Aam Aadmi, is the Hindi equivalent used quite often. I could switch on the TV right now and one of the English channels would be saying ‘but amidst all this there is no relief for the common man,’ or ‘the common man continues to suffer.’

A legendary journalism teacher asked our class as to why we thought that a particular newspaper was the best in the region. The answer given was that it satisfies the common man. The next question kept hanging in the air for a while longer: How do you know that an ABC newspaper satisfies the common man? The answer came from within me and 17 years later I still cherish the joy it gave me. ABC is the best newspaper in the region, and I know that it satisfies the common man because it satisfies me. For Prabhashji, it was the way of life throughout. I don’t know from when the journalist became different from the common man? The headline that I just read in the Chandigarh Tribune says, ‘The man who felt the pulse of the people.’ Who are these people?

Prabhashji could have done all that by feeling his own pulse. He instinctively knew the concerns of the common man because he was one himself; and that perhaps was one of the reasons for his mass appeal. I am borrowing from a story in Sify that has quoted Pankaj Pachauri of NDTV news channel saying: “Prabhashji was someone who never came under any pressure, either political or market pressure. He was one of his kind. He single-handedly ran a campaign against communal forces at the time of the Ram Janmabhoomi campaign.” Hats off to you, Prabhashji!

Prabhashji loved cricket and Sachin Tendulkar; but it wasn’t just that and his reading of the game was tremendous. When I first heard Prabhashji on an NDTV cricket programme, it left me mesmerized. He was brilliant; and it is my bad luck that I could not hear his views on the game more often.

Renowned sports journalist Pradeep Magazine started his career when Prabhash Joshi was the editor of The Indian Express in Chandigarh. “There was a child in him; and I think Prabhashji understood that in journalism everyone is a victim of the system. He felt that sport was still innocent and his passion for cricket helped him remain sane and kept that child inside alive. I owe my career to him. The work he did after his retirement was phenomenal; as he had unshackled himself, and was no longer tied to any master,” Pradeep paused and carefully chose each and every word while describing Prabhashji.

That Pradeep Magazine had worked for about three years directly under the editorship of Prabhash Joshi was something I learnt only a day ago while reading another tribute. This is when I thought that a first job with Prabhash Joshi must have had a big impact on Magazine as a person and also as a professional entering the field. In my association with Pradeep Magazine, I have found him to be a simple man with a lot of warmth. The big thing is that he takes criticism even better than praise and will not let that affect his friendship. Most importantly; just like Prabhashji, he is upright and fearless.

Sometime in mid-1997, when I was about to move on from the Down To Earth, Prabhashji’s son Sopan had just joined the environment and science fortnightly. It was just for a few months that we worked together as colleagues. He was cheerful, fun-loving and never mentioned anything about his father until the information leaked out through the HR forms he had filled. He had a bindass attitude towards life.

Sopan took a media roundtrip before coming back to Down To Earth as the managing editor of the fortnightly. The few months in 1997 were enough to seal a friendship that has lasted more than a decade; though most often it is just a phone call. On that day I just messaged him; as I knew the cremation was at the banks of the Narmada. Yesterday, I got to speak to Sopan for the first time since the Hyderabad match was turned off after Sachin’s wicket that day. Prabhashji had a bypass surgery done many years ago and also had a pacemaker since the last few years. He complained of chest pain that night and could not make it to a private hospital.

The travel schedule of Prabhashji was very hectic and he wasn’t resting as much as the doctors and the family would have wanted him to. I knew what an unreasonable question it was to ask Sopan as to why they did not stop him, or advise him against travelling. He said they used to try. I understood that the man who never got cornered or gave up under pressure, by either the political or the market forces; would not have had it any other way.

It has been a big personal loss for my friend but he was composed when he returned my call yesterday; in this tough time he spoke with ease and concealed grief. Sopan was straight as an arrow and I don’t think he would have changed much because the down to earth quality that he had, came first by living with an extraordinary ordinary man; who was father to Sopan and an inspiration to millions.

Sopan also knows that it is a personal loss for me in a different way; the loss of one of the editors who placed ethics and transparency above all else—and both of us were quite sure that there are such people in the media mainstream. The dilemma for the editor is always ethical and never intellectual; and the one who has it in him/her faces it in a direct manner.

Mark Twain must have met a few editors of the kind that even I have had the pleasure of working with in my journalistic career of about 16 years when he said: “I am not the editor of a newspaper and shall always try to do right and be good so that God will not make me one.” The salaries have gone up many-fold and that in itself is a very good thing but it also has a flip-side; as the editors who can’t earn respect can at least resort to buying it.

Prabhashji was different. He earned it all his life.

Tendulkar And The Zen Masters

The Master, in most of the mystic religious sects around the world is a man that can be described as the finite form of the infinite. The word is used in most of the religions of the East; like in Japan, where an ‘enlightened’ Zen monk is referred to as a Master. The 20th Century American writer J.D. Salinger, known largely for his ‘unusually brilliant’ and ‘controversial’ book The Catcher In The Rye used a Japanese ‘haiku’ (poem) in his book Franny and Zooey, first published as a story in two parts in The New Yorker magazine as Franny in 1955 and Zooey in 1957. The haiku by Kobayashi Issa (1763 – 1828) translated in English goes:

O Snail,
Climb Mount Fuji,
But slowly, slowly!

There are many interpretations of the haiku and one way of looking at it is that man can reach the summit by having the endurance to overcome adversity. Forgive me for digressing but this is the closest that I can come to describing the mastery of the man who is popularly known as the Little Master around the cricketing world. An old Japanese proverb says that a wise man climbs Mount Fuji once in his life and only a fool climbs it again; the implied meaning for the fool here is that it is so tough and has such inclement weather that only the really-daring would go again.

If Mount Fuji had a cricketing equivalent then Tendulkar is the man who has been living at the summit for just a few days less than 20 years now. There is no typhoon greater than the one he can still generate and there is no one from his time who has survived the hostile weather of international cricket with such elegance that even the violence that flows from his blade looks like the serene poise of a Zen monk.

On the eve of the fifth game in Hyderabad, the Indian captain MS Dhoni said, “Top order batsmen need to bat well and not rely on the lower order. If you are playing with seven batsmen, it’s better to get a big score from six of them rather than use the seventh, who we call as a backup batsman, especially when you are chasing. If one among the top order gets a big score it becomes easy for us as the others can rotate around him.”

The man on top of everything heeded the captain’s call and apart from another one at number six, no one else found it easy to rotate around him. Australia had belted 350, riding on the momentum they had picked when India had dropped it in the second-half of the ODI in Mohali.

For Australia just the top order came out to bat and everyone scored above a run a ball. Shaun Marsh and Watson scored 112 and 97 respectively. Ponting made a run-a-ball 45 and White and Hussey gave the finishing kick.

No matter what the conditions and the trueness of the wicket, chasing 350 is the cricketing equivalent of climbing Mount Fuji; and it was too stiff a climb for one man to pull the weight of 9 others. Apart from Tendulkar—who made a sparkling 175 in 141 balls studded with 19 square jewels and four large-sized pearls—the other significant contribution in the chase came in the form of a 59 from Raina at number 6. The 38 from Sehwag and the 23 from Jadeja had the possibility of becoming significant but Sehwag played one shot too many and Jadeja for the second time in the series ran as if his run out was essential to India’s victory.

If I look at the top 5 then it was just one man who made it possible that the game came down to holding one’s nerve in the end. At the stage where 19 runs were needed in 18 balls with four wickets in hand and a set Tendulkar batting as good as he ever had; the match was India’s to lose.

Tendulkar single-handedly kept India in the hunt; he played the booming drives, the lofted on the rise strokes clearing the inner circle, the delicate and the furious square cuts. He used the pace of the bowlers, when his deft touch was needed to place the ball behind the wicket on either side. Tendulkar danced down the wicket to hit the spinners out of the attack. He played perfect chip shots and the pulls that went along the ground. The Master bisected the boundary raiders using his wrists as if they were meant to solve a geometric problem. He dusted his cupboard to bring out a pull shot that sailed for a six over midwicket. He played with a fearless flamboyance so that the newcomers could adjust to the wicket without worrying about the run-rate.

Earlier, as Australia had preserved wickets, their late charge added 90 runs in 48 balls for the team. The way the Little Master had calculated and scored from the beginning and then in a big partnership with Raina; his team needed just 52 runs in the last 48 balls. The Aussie bowling had been thrashed, mainly by Tendulkar and to an extent by Sehwag and Raina. Two overs changed the game after Tendulkar and Raina had put India completely in front. The first of the two overs was the 43rd and the second was the 48th. In the 43rd over bowled by Watson, one run came for the loss of Raina and Harbhajan.

It has been such a series for Australia that it would not be surprising if an Aussie tourist is picked and brought to the ground in case Ponting suddenly finds that he is left with only 10 fit men for a game. The score-line says 3-2 in Australia’s favour and that is a massive achievement by an inexperienced as well as an injury-hit team that Ponting leads. I don’t think I’ll see a headline that says ‘India out to hit injury-hit Australia’ again in this series at least.

In the 48th over again two wickets fell for 3 runs. A crestfallen Tendulkar departed to a rising ovation off the first ball of the over. From the beginning he knew how to climb this summit; he created and shaped the reply knowing exactly where and how to take a risk and to keep his companions steady. There was nothing that could stop him in Hyderabad and even after the dismissal of Raina and Harbhajan; 32 more runs were added between Jadeja and Tendulkar.

And then the Master came down from the peak and made an error of judgement; as in that form no bowler could have taken his wicket had he kept his shot selection on the cautious side. After the dismissal he saw his work of art falling short just like it did in Chennai 1999. He had been phenomenal in Hyderabad but in the presentation ceremony he looked the most-disappointed and the-most forlorn man. Tendulkar knows it very well that the infinite is expected of the Master. And he knows that people forgive everyone but they never forgive a genius.

Australian Cricket And The Art Of Losing

It was a wonderful performance by Australia at Mohali and Indian captain Dhoni would be fuming with the way his top order is functioning in this series. And he has all the right to be incensed with the consistency shown by his batsmen.

This is a depleted Australian side and without quite a few big performers that were there in the team that India defeated in the two finals of the Commonwealth Bank Series in Sydney and Brisbane last year.

Matthew Hayden, Adam Gilchrist, Michael Clarke, Brad Haddin, Andrew Symonds, Nathan Bracken and Brad Hogg are out of the line-up. Three of them have retired and four have fitness issues. On top of that Brett Lee and James Hopes have also joined the injury list but the series is hanging in balance at 2-2.

There is no problem with Brett Lee talking about a 7-0 result in Australia’s favour before the series; he was basically reinforcing the Aussie mindset in the absence of McGrath and Warne; who used to say it before every series. On the contrary, a 6-1 result in India’s favour should have been a realistic goal considering that the Indian captain had most of the first choice players available at home.

Dhoni has defended his young players and also the senior ones in public but in private he must be seething that the 2-2 could easily have been 4-0 in India’s favour. Mind you, I am not taking the credit away from Australia. The score-line is equal only because it has been an Australian side; no matter who has played or missed or even made his debut in this tour. The reason for the Australian performance has been articulated nicely by Ian Chappell on many occasions: Australia never beats itself and firmly believes that it is the job of the opposition to beat them.

In the ODI played at Mohali, the top 5 Aussie batsmen scored 208 runs out of the 250 that their team scored. It was a below par score courtesy disciplined bowling and superb fielding by India on a good batting strip. The top 5 Indian batsmen scored 118 runs between themselves and if you add number six and seven as well the Indian score goes up to 142 runs. The reason of defeat is pretty obvious.

In Vadodara, the top 5 Australian batsmen scored 253 out of the 292 runs that the team scored. The top order of India in that match scored 159 runs out of the 293 required and if I add the number six and seven as well the total goes up to 173. This is poor performance as a batting unit like captain Dhoni said. The two experienced Australian batsmen Hussey and Ponting have scored six fifties between them; one low score and a forty. No two players in the Indian dressing room have been so consistent.

Virat Kohli and Ravinder Jadeja and to some degree Suresh Raina must understand that golden opportunities would not come forever and they must look at Gambhir, who has cemented his position by using his chances so well. Sehwag, Tendulkar, Dhoni and Yuvraj have won matches single-handedly on many occasions and they would be handled with kid gloves because of that; but there is a long list waiting if these three are found wanting.

Australia was winning almost everything in limited overs and Test matches with a great team till a few years ago. Ironically, though, the most important lesson that can be learned from Australia is on how to lose. Some of the best Test matches from the mid-1990s to 2006 have been the ones that Australia has lost; as a friend of mine once pointed out. They have been great because Australia has demonstrated how much you need to do to take a match away from them. Remember Edgbaston 2005; and the match Australia saved after that and then Trent Bridge; where Ponting was fuming after substitute fielder Gary Pratt’s throw ran him out. How difficult was it to chase 129 runs against Australia in Trent Bridge and the 155 odd that India had to make in Chennai in 2001?

It is not the same unit and the best that India can now do is to get a 5-2 result; which is quite possible given their strength on paper. Sadly for India, strength on paper means nothing. What counts is that Dhoni has got the best out of the team in such situations before and there is no reason why he can’t do it now. He is a sharp captain who realises that any slackness now could easily be the same score-line in Australia’s favour.

Dhoni Personifies 21st Century Leadership

It was 97 for 3 after 15.1 overs when MS Dhoni joined Gautam Gambhir in the second ODI in Nagpur and from here he gently nudged India to a position from where he and Suresh Raina could then ferociously turn the course of the match.

The first ball that Dhoni faced was a bouncer from Hilfenhaus; he didn’t pick it and took evasive action without his eyes on the ball. It hit him on the back of the helmet, but he was alive to the possibility of a leg-bye; and at the non-striker’s end he could even afford a smile.

The rebuilding process began with the scrambling for ones and twos; haring between the wickets and picking the odd boundary in between. The period reminded me of a brilliant half-century that Dhoni got against Sri Lanka and saw India home without hitting a single boundary in Adelaide last year. The 119-run fourth wicket partnership at over six an over was broken with the strange run-out of Gambhir—the second time he’s lost his wicket recently while backing up.

Raina joined Dhoni with 16 overs remaining and India in a good position with 216 on the board. The next five overs yielded just 22 runs as Raina had time to get his eye in. India was 251 for 4 in 41 overs when the deft stealing had been done and the loot began. And what a loot it was.

In the next 8 overs India plundered 98 runs as Dhoni’s bottom-hand and Raina’s innovative hitting mercilessly butchered the Aussie attack. Dhoni may have curbed his style with additional responsibilities but he showed how much muscle he can pack into those typical MSD strokes if the situation demands. He jumped from 90 to 108 with three bottom-handed sixes in four balls. Flat sixes and fours that went like tracer bullets flowed from his bat before he fell in the last over having made 124 in 107 balls. There was ample support from the two southpaws and Gambhir’s 76 and Raina’s 62 later gave the captain the license to kill.

After losing his first ODI series as captain against Australia at home 4-2; Dhoni has won every bilateral ODI series home and away. The losses have been in tournaments with a format involving more than two teams; the Kitply and the Asia Cup and the two World tournaments this year.

The two finals that India won in the last edition of the Commonwealth Bank Series in Australia are the crowning glory of India’s ODI achievements. Teams with big names on paper have played in the tri-series before and Australia has mostly proved to be too hot to handle in the finals. Dhoni got Praveen Kumar and Piyush Chawla in the playing XI in the finals. Praveen opened the attack and took two vital wickets and Piyush was given the ball when Hayden and Symonds were hitting the seamers easily. They justified the captain’s faith amply and Australia managed a gettable 239 in 50 overs.

It needed a big performance on the big stage to go past Australia; and a magnificent 117 not out by Tendulkar and his vigilant and daring 123-run partnership with young Rohit Sharma, who made 66, ensured that India went to Brisbane with a lead. “He has scored 16,000 runs. I haven’t even played 16,000 balls.” That was the pithy comment from Dhoni when asked, halfway through the CB Series, if he was bothered by his senior-most batsman failing to make big runs. When his experience and ability to fashion a chase in a big match was needed Tendulkar played the perfect innings in a perfect chase.

The business was finished in Brisbane and Dhoni stepped back a little and asked for the youngest member in the team; and a grinning Chawla held the trophy aloft. That and the T-shirt he put on a young Indian fan after the World T20 win symbolises his leadership.

His giving Ganguly those few overs to lead the Test team for one last time before bowing out showed the magnanimity of his leadership—and coming ahead of all the big names in the Mohali Test showed he can take tough decisions easily if needed. He does not shy from trusting a youngster at the deep end of the sea. He respects the present and the past achievers but is pretty-much his own man. He has no need to foist himself on the team or to seek respect and that is one of the reasons why he earns it so well. Dhoni personifies the leadership required for a 21st Century India.

What Mirror! Tendulkar breaks one daily

A battle within a battle is the additional spice that gives flavour to any cricket series. The 7-match ODI series between India and Australia is the battlefield after India’s first round exit from the Champions Trophy. The tale of two champions, Ricky Ponting and Sachin Tendulkar, is an indirect scrap within the direct clash. Tendulkar has had an indifferent start to the series; failing in the first two games while Ponting, with a first match 74, has started well.

After India’s first round exit from the 2007 World Cup, former Australian captain Ian Chappell in his column for Mumbai-based tabloid Mid-Day wrote: “If he (Tendulkar) had found an honest mirror three years ago and asked the question; “Mirror, mirror on the wall who is the best batsman of all?” It would’ve answered; “Brian Charles Lara.”
If he asked that same mirror right now; “Mirror, mirror on the wall should I retire?” The answer would be; “Yes.”

Ian is an astute reader of the game and his brother Greg a batting legend; but like ordinary mortals they too can and have been proven wrong. The biggest mistake in the 2007 World Cup, in my view, was to push Tendulkar down the order. In 61 innings at number four Tendulkar has 4 hundreds and 15 fifties at 38.84 with a strike rate of 77.08. At the top of the order he has 40 hundreds and 70 fifties at an average of 48.08 with a strike rate of 87.56—the simplest reason for where he should bat is in front.

I’ll come to the Chappell brothers later and pick a few points in the contemporary debate. After 18 Tests, Ponting had 2 hundreds and 6 fifties at 37.25 while Tendulkar at the same juncture had 3 hundreds and 4 fifties at 38.68; not any significant disparity. The difference was in the circumstances and the manner: ‘God is in the details’, as architect Ludwig Mies said.

Tendulkar was a name doing the rounds even before his debut as the cricketing grapevine circulates in Test-playing nations. Cricket journalist Mark Ray wrote in The Sunday Age of how he lingered at the nets to see India’s ‘Boy Wonder’ bat early in the 1992 Australian tour.

The Wisden Almanack report after the Old Trafford Test in August 1990 said: “Of the six individual centuries scored in this fascinating contest, none was more outstanding than Tendulkar’s; which rescued India on the final afternoon. More significantly, after several of his colleagues had fallen to reckless strokes, Tendulkar held the England attack at bay with a display of immense maturity.” He was 17 years and 112 days old at that time.

The legend, though, was born in the fifth Test played at the Western Australia Cricket Association Ground, Perth from Feb 1-5, 1992. The conversation in the Australian dressing room among sweaty and burly hard men turned to a cherubic-faced young boy about three months shy of turning 19 and born and brought up on low and slow Indian wickets. The boy had defied a steaming four-pronged Australian pace attack for over four hours on the fastest and the bounciest pitch in the world with a mixture of grace and power that his opponents found hard to fathom in one so young.

Merv Hughes cracked open a beer and turned to his captain, Allan Border; the tough Aussie credited with rebuilding the side. “This little prick’s going to get more runs than you, AB.”* Tendulkar had announced himself with a 148 not out in Sydney—the debut match of Shane Warne—but it was not until the fifth Test at the WACA, where the ball whizzed around his ears and he scored 114 that he made a major impression. “The one in Perth, he made them in tough conditions and he looked as though he was at home,” Hughes said.

The next time Australia played in a Test match in Perth with four quicks and no specialist spinner was on January 16, 2008 in the third Test against India. The Test where India became the first team from the subcontinent to win at Perth. The boy was too young in 1992 and in 2008 doubts lingered that the man may be too old; it didn’t matter to the man and like the boy he also reached Perth having made runs in Sydney—this time a 154 not out. Tendulkar made an audacious 71 before falling to an unlucky lbw decision. He finished with 493 runs at 70.42; his best ever return from any series.

The little master’s peak years in the mid- and late-nineties, when he decimated bowling attacks all around the world have been well-documented and can be left for this specific argument. On the third of November 2002 Tendulkar had 31 hundreds and 34 fifties at an average of 58.46 in 103 Tests; he was 19 hundreds and 18 fifties clear of Ponting. It was a gap that could only have been bridged if Ponting had a few out of the world seasons and Tendulkar remained stationary. That is how it went, almost.

The incredible passage of play from the Brisbane Test in 2002 to the end of the 2nd Ashes Test in Adelaide 2006 established Ponting as a modern great; he played 48 Tests and scored 21 hundreds and 19 fifties at a phenomenal average of 73.86 in this period. Perhaps the best run for such a lengthy period in the modern era. Tendulkar, in this period, played 30 Test matches and made 4 hundreds at 43.23—an injury-marred passage in which he underwent two surgeries and made three international comebacks.

After Adelaide in 2006 Ponting has played 29 Tests and added 5 hundreds and 13 fifties at 42.97. Tendulkar after December 18, 2006 has played 26 Tests and scored 7 hundreds and 12 fifties at 52.23. In the last two seasons the little master’s graph is again climbing; in the Test matches he has played with a combination of compact technique and eclectic stroke-play.

In the limited overs Tendulkar returned to the opening slot after the 2007 World Cup. In the 46 games after that he has scored three hundreds and 14 fifties at 47.04 and a strike rate of 85.39. All three hundreds have been match-winning knocks and two of them have been in tournament finals; seven of his fifties have been scores of 90 plus. He has scored higher than his overall average since the World Cup match. There is no one in the same vicinity to even think of any comparison here.

Ian Chappell wrote in a 2005 Mid-Day column after the Ganguly-Greg Chappell controversy: “However, if you don’t want to hear the truth, then don’t ask him (Greg) for a frank opinion. Greg Chappell grew up in a household where frank opinions were served up at the breakfast table more often than cereal and fruit juice.”

Being upfront is a virtue that our cricket administration or our administration in general can benefit from and there should be no issue with the Chappell brothers on that count. An honest mirror at this stage, though, would tell Tendulkar that his wish is the only command. He has defied enough studio pundits for any mirror to be able to speculate on his future.

The Chappell brothers, though, can benefit from an honest mirror, as it may tell them frankly that prophecy is not their strong point and they should resist playing soothsayers.

*Sources — Chloe Saltau for The Age and for stats and Wisden Almanack opinions — Crininfo and Cricinfo archives

The Greg Chappell Years

Sometime in the spring of 2005, two Australians were among the contenders for coaching jobs in the sub-continent; in India and Sri Lanka—Australian legend Greg Chappell and former Aussie all-rounder Tom Moody. India’s deciding committee was impressed by Chappell’s presentation and his ‘commitment to excellence’ mantra was given a green signal. A few days later Sri Lanka signed Tom Moody.

When the Aussie legend took over the Indian team in the summer of 2005, India’s own living legend was in London for a surgery on his left arm after tennis elbow had forced him to miss the middle part of 2004. Ganguly was under some pressure after a poor Test series at home against Pakistan while Dravid was in the form of his life and had played some memorable innings 2001 onwards.

The Indian team left for Zimbabwe for a two-Test series and a tri-nation ODI tournament with Chappell as the coach and Ganguly as the captain. The fire that began in India’s tour to this landlocked country in the southern part of Africa; and the incidents that further helped its spread across the Indian Ocean caused ripples that were felt by the two cricketing nations of Australia and India.

This period of turbulence led to Ganguly being removed as captain and later dropped from the side. It is not possible to give an accurate account of the dressing room incidents and is prudent to just keep it as a background without delving into various versions. The return of Ganguly as a Test batsman in the South African Test tour though is a story of amazing human possibilities; he certainly made a statement and the manner of his run-making in Tests said a lot about his stubborn character.

After slightly over six months on October 25, 2005, Tendulkar opened his account in the second legal delivery he faced against Sri Lanka in an ODI in Nagpur. It was a ball that was full and a trifle wide outside the off stump; Tendulkar reached for it and the coruscating drive burned the grass on its way to the cover boundary. He was batting on 11 off 11 balls when he first faced Fernando, bowling his 2nd over; he missed the first ball and played a front foot drive off the second for no run.

The third ball was a relief for millions; it was a pick-up shot that sailed over the midwicket fence for a six. Tendulkar’s riposte to speculation on his future was nothing less than stunning; he made 93 off 96 balls. This was a start to the season where India won 6-1 against Sri Lanka, 4-1 against Pakistan in Pakistan, a 2-2 draw against South Africa and a 5-1 win against England.

India left for the World Cup in decent current form but crashed out in the first round and with it also ended the association of Chappell with the team. There are no questions about Greg Chappell’s place among the game’s batting greats but his coaching career is not above reproach or rather not as glorious as his playing career.

Greg Chappell then said that India would struggle in Australia with just one tour game well before the 2007 Boxing Day Test in Melbourne. Then about 12 days or so before the tour, the Herald Sun ran a story headlined “India ‘old and selfish’, says former coach Greg Chappell”. The story said that Greg expected India to be well-beaten.

Written by Ron Reed, the story talked about an absorbing and candid documentary on Chappell’s incumbency called Guru Greg. It also dealt with Chappell’s views on India’s World Cup debacle. “We came here with a flawed group and got the results we deserved,” he said. “If there is not an intention of change, there’s no point in me—or any other coaches, for that matter—getting involved. It’s very difficult to keep putting wallpaper over the cracks. The cracks have got big and the structure needs to be dealt with.”

The story said that the views of Chappell before India’s arrival would dishearten fans. “Chappell’s honest opinion has poured cold water on the hopes of many cricket fans that the Indians would provide a more competitive series against the Australians in an already dull summer of cricket. It is a depressing thought for anyone hoping for a more competitive series than Sri Lanka has been able to provide so far,” the story added.

A Test tour to Australia is the biggest challenge in the international calendar; and a series win on Australian soil the most-prized possession for a team and its fans. Have a look at the calendar and see if our cricket board has in any way facilitated the players in giving them the best chance of succeeding in Australia. The ODI season was packed till November 18th and the Test season went on till December 12th 2007.

The Indian team arrived jet-lagged and the solitary tour game was washed out and they had to badly-lose the first Test to acclimatise; although it was a surface that according to Australia suited India the most. At least a fortnight of total rest and then a conditioning camp followed by at least two if not three tour games would have been some justice towards the team. It may have also revealed form and adjustment factor and Sehwag may have played right from the first match.

Despite all the impediments; the players gave the Aussies a series that was a bit more than just competitive. India lost in Melbourne and won in Perth; the den where Australia used a four-pronged pace attack. Adelaide was a draw. And Sydney was the whole point.

Sir Neville Cardus once said, “There ought to be some other means of reckoning quality in this best and loveliest of games; the scoreboard is an ass.” So it was a 2-1 result in favour of Australia and Ishant Sharma, according to bowling figures just took a solitary wicket in the Australian second innings in Perth. The story beyond the scoreboard is the fascinating beauty of the game. Tendulkar ended the Test series with his best return ever; two big hundreds and two sizzling scores of 63 and 71.

The young team that came for the ODIs defeated the number 1 side in the world in their backyard by winning the first two finals of the Commonwealth Bank Series; you were right Greg, but the young team won it on the back of an unbeaten hundred and a 91 by the ‘legendary old man’.

When Australia came to India, Guru Greg was with the Aussie contingent in Bangalore but was nowhere to be seen afterwards. Ganguly had announced that it would be his last series and got a hundred in Mohali and debutant Amit Mishra took five wickets. India won by 320 runs.

Tendulkar rounded off another good series with a hundred in Nagpur and the captaincy baton passed to Dhoni. India won the series 2-0 to claim the Border-Gavaskar Trophy. The Sachin Tendulkar chapter is in its most-beautiful phase and Greg Chappell could do well to remember that, “Age is an issue of mind over matter. If you don’t mind, it doesn’t matter.”

Dr Peter’s Classic Elucidates Incompetence

“Late at night, a drunk staggers across Red Square in front of the Kremlin, singing at the top of his voice, ‘Brezhnev is an idiot! Brezhnev is an idiot!’ Immediately, several KGB agents close in on him and haul him off to jail. The following morning he appears before the judge, who declares his sentence, ‘Twenty years and two days of hard labour in Siberia.’ The man cries out in disbelief, ‘Twenty years and two days! But why? I was only drunk in public.’ And the judge responds, ‘Two days are for being drunk in public. Twenty years for betraying a state secret.’”

The DNA newspaper in July and August carried a couple of columns with The Peter Principle as the overarching theme. The one in July was about an antidote to the principle and the piece in August applied the principle to explore if PM Manmohan Singh had found his level of incompetence at Sharm el-Sheikh—both done by R. Jagannathan.

The 1969 book The Peter Principle and the phrase it defined are considered comedic-yet-classic cornerstones of organisational thought. The Peter Principle states that ‘in a hierarchy every employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence.’ Dr Laurence J. Peter compiled his data for the founding and development of the salutary science of ‘Hierarchiology’. Dr Peter concluded that for every job that existed in the world there was someone, somewhere, who could not do it. Given sufficient time and enough promotions he would get that job! So there is a good enough chance that the drunk staggering around was probably telling the truth.

The other DNA piece refers to First, Break All The Rules by Marcus Buckingham and Curt Coffman, which the DNA calls a path-breaking book that helps bypass The Peter Principle. The 1999-book is a good resource for managers and HR professionals; but not path-breaking. Dr Peter gave original, ‘twisted’ and valid ways to counter The Peter Principle, so the path had already been laid. Dr Peter’s original terminology for occupational issues like ‘copelessness’ or ‘lateral arabesque’ are part of the book’s immense appeal.

Robert I. Sutton, the author of The No Asshole Rule, narrates a small story in the foreword for the 1969 classic that would sound familiar to a lot of people. Robert’s father Lewis Sutton ran a company in San Francisco that sold furniture and related equipment that was installed on United States Navy Ships. His livelihood depended on US government bureaucrats and shipyard managers. Robert grew up listening to his father’s tirades on how these ‘overpaid idiots’ wanted that he produce and procure poorly-designed furnishings, how they could barely do their jobs, and how pathetically lazy they were. To make matters worse, senior government officials produced an onslaught of absurd procedures that required him to jump through an ever-expanding maze of administrative hoops—which wasted his time, drove up his costs, and made him crazy. He concluded: The morons at the top must be paid to waste as much taxpayer money as possible.

Consider journalist Raymond Hull’s experience: “I receive mail from a large university. Fifteen months ago I changed my address. I sent the usual notice to the university: my mail kept going to the old address. After two-more notices and a phone call, I made a personal visit. I pointed with my finger to the wrong address in their records, dictated the new address and watched a secretary take it down. The mail still went to the old address. Two days ago there was a new development. I received a phone call from the woman who had succeeded me in my old apartment and who, of course, had been receiving my mail from the university. She herself had just moved again, and my mail from the university has now started going to her new address!”

Raymond was grumbling one evening, during the second break of a dull play, about incompetent actors and directors, when he got into a conversation with Dr Laurence J. Peter, a scientist who had devoted many years to the study of incompetence. The break was too short and Hull went to Dr Peter’s house and sat till 3:00 am listening to the lucid and original exposition of a theory that at last answered his question, “Why incompetence?”

As Dr Peter had a busy schedule he agreed to a collaboration: Dr Peter would place his extensive research and huge manuscript with Hull, who would condense it into a book. The result is a required reading for those who don’t mind laughing at themselves.

The decision to read on is irrevocable and Hull says it must not be taken lightly. “If you read, you can never regain your present state of blissful ignorance; you will never again unthinkingly venerate your superiors or dominate your subordinates. Never! The Peter Principle, once heard, cannot be forgotten.”

The key to bypassing and unlocking The Peter Principle is inside you and me; and every lock is different so no one can help anyone but oneself. The Peter Principle offers life-quality-improvement over mindless promotion to oblivion.

South Africa And India In Wonderland: “Curiouser and Curiouser!”

It says something about Australia—and a whole lot more about the other world teams—that with just two seasoned world-class batsmen, two proven performers with the ball and aided by an all-rounder with reasonable experience they comfortably won the Champions Trophy.

Out of the line-up that India faced when they last played Australia in March 2008—the two finals of the Commonwealth Bank Series that India won—only five familiar faces lifted the Champions Trophy. With this win, Australia is back to the top of the ICC ODI rankings; followed by India, South Africa and New Zealand. South Africa and India are very confounding cases; both of them were jostling for the number one position for quite some time before the Champions Trophy. The consistent cricket that they have played over a year reflects their rise in ODI rankings.

Their performances in big tournaments, on the contrary, can best be defined by the immortal words that Lewis Carroll gave Alice in his masterpiece Alice in Wonderland: “Curiouser and Curiouser!” These words came to Alice after she fell down a rabbit hole and was so bewildered by what she saw that she even forgot to speak proper English. It is since then used as literary shorthand to describe wonder and disbelief; and the kind of perplexity that India and South Africa display in major tournaments.

With the 2007 World Cup in sight, Aussie legend Greg Chappell was taken as India’s coach in May 2005 and fellow Australian Tom Moody took over Sri Lanka. In far away South Africa Mickey Arthur replaced Ray Jennings as the national coach. The first big World tournament for the new coaches and their teams was the 2006 Champions Trophy in India.

India was knocked out in the first round at home. South Africa reached the semi-final but got blown away by a Chris Gayle tropical storm that hit Sawai Mansingh Stadium, Jaipur. Gayle blasted 133 not out and the Windies chased 259 with 6 overs to spare. Australia routed the West Indies to claim the only silverware missing in their impressive collection.

In the last 6 world tournaments going back to the 2004 Champions Trophy in England; South Africa have not reached a single final and India have crashed before the first hurdle 5 times and they eventually won the solitary event where they went ahead; an uncanny position for consistently-winning teams.

India was out of the 2007 World Cup in the filtering process of the initial stage. They lost two of their 3 qualifying matches. South Africa got to the semi-final, and Smith said he’s never seen the squad so confident after winning the toss against Australia. That became a non-issue as the ‘Pigeon’ was on full flight that day in St. Lucia; nibbling the heart of South African batting and leaving them bleeding at 27 for 5 in 9.5 overs. McGrath got Kallis, Prince, and Boucher in his first spell. Australia trampled South Africa on their way to the final.

Greg Chappell resigned after the World Cup, having spent 18 months with the team and Moody moved on from Sri Lanka. Dhoni led a young Indian team that had an indifferent start to the inaugural World T20 championship in South Africa and faced two must-win games against England and the fancied South Africa.

Yuvraj came in to bat with India at 155 for 3 and 3.2 overs left against England; he was on strike when Stuart Broad came in to bowl the 19th over. It was a spectacle or a bloody carnage depending on how one saw it; 6 massive sixes in six balls got Yuvraj to 50 in 12 balls. He used the depth of the crease with great anticipation to get under the ball and time it beautifully, without ever committing early. With 218 runs on board, England fell short by 18.

The last match of the Group stage between South Africa and India was an organiser’s delight: all three teams—South Africa, New Zealand, and India—had a chance to go to the semi-finals with the probabilities in that order. After a bad start, a gritty performance by Rohit Sharma (50) and Dhoni (45) got India to 153. Two great moments in the field and three perfect deliveries reduced SA to 31 for 5 inside 6 overs. Boucher and Morkel took the score to 97 for 5 in 16 overs; 29 needed in 24 balls to qualify and 57 to win; South Africa finished on 116 for 9 in 20 overs.

In the semi-final Yuvraj came up the order and was brilliant again: 70 in 30 balls. India posted a healthy 188 and Australia fell short by 15. Dhoni and his young team lifted the championship in a fight-to-the-finish final with Pakistan.

The defending champions crashed out of the 2009 version at the first hurdle; losing all their three big games. South Africa was brilliant throughout and had accounted for everything, even for the inherent unpredictability of this format.

Pakistan reached the semis in tatters; their journey was nothing short of miraculous. It can be best described by the modifiers used in headlines after they lost to England. Sloppy Pakistan face litmus test—this classic was before the Netherlands game. Then rusty, lacking discipline and erratic; the analysis after the New Zealand match said Charismatic Pakistan.

The semi-final for which South Africa had accounted for everything, they could not account for one man; neither with the bat nor with the ball. Afridi came in at number 3 and made the fastest fifty of the match in 34 balls; very slow by his standards—since he has an ODI hundred in 37 balls against Sri Lanka. His bowling figures were 4-0-16-2; the only bowler to take two wickets and the most frugal. With 29 needed in two overs, Umar Gul bowled the 19th over, perhaps the best over at death that cricket has seen for a while. Just six singles and the buffer of 23 for the last over was more than enough.

When Pakistan met Sri Lanka in their Group match at Lord’s on the 12th of June, the green and blue intermingled; they stood alongside each other in their first meeting after that Lahore morning. And after the wheel turned a full circle to bring these two teams as final adversaries, it became an event that transcended sport. That this final was being played was in itself an immensity that made the game and its result completely inconsequential.

As for India and South Africa, the perplexity is at the opposite ends of the spectrum—India’s bane has mostly been the first hurdle, in fact the first match; and for South Africa it has usually been near the end. India needs to wake up and get their act together for the first match and South Africa needs to avoid sleeping near the end.

In The Best Traditions Of Pakistan Cricket

“Pakistan now moves ahead with the momentum that makes them so lethal by their side. It would be tempting to put your money on them but it would not be wise: Some things are best left uncertain.”

This last line of my previous post after Australia and Pakistan played a memorable match at the SuperSport Park, Centurion is just the right beginning that I needed for this post after New Zealand won the semi-final at the New Wanderers Stadium in Johannesburg.

Pakistan, as many cricket writers say, is a dangerous team when it starts gaining momentum. Momentum largely is a constant that helps every team more or less. The traditional process-driven approach of gaining momentum by getting the balance of the team right and keeping the winning habit going works for everyone, including Pakistan.

That apart, the Pakistan team is the most ‘receptive and volatile’ to a different kind of momentum, the mechanism of which cannot be described perfectly. That they have gained this momentum can be seen and felt plainly, but what has triggered it is at best a good guess. The big moments of Pakistan cricket have come through this backdoor that is not of their making; their credit is only being open and vulnerable to ‘an unspecific trigger’ that gives them a non-traditional momentum.

Osman Samiuddin, Pakistan editor Cricinfo, wrote a piece like a raconteur that lends credence to my drift in this piece. The piece was done on Pakistani cricket two days before the T20 final on Sunday.
“A triumph it already is, come what may Sunday. Astrophysics may be easier to comprehend than this situation, even if it is unlikely astrophysics has ever brought as much joy as this.

It has been an uneven, uplifting ride, in the best traditions of Pakistan. Just to know that they are still capable of it is relief in itself; indeed the worst fear over the last two years was that Pakistan had succumbed to the curse of bland mediocrity. But to know that they are still capable of doing what they did to South Africa in the same fortnight as what they allowed England to do to them; is to know that the soul of all Pakistan sides is alive and well.”

Waqar Younis, in an informal chat with Harsha Bhogle for a show broadcast a few years ago, smilingly said that he’ll never forgive Jadeja for what he did; talking about the 1996 World Cup. Waqar then added that Pakistan had their best team in the 1996 World Cup; in my view as well that was a very strong team. Not the all-time best but the best of the last 18 years or so.

When Osman talked about the amazing run of Pakistan after it had reached the T20 final in 2009 he was hesitant in bracketing it with the inaugural T20 World Cup or with the 1999 World Cup where also Pakistan had made it to the finals; instead he saw this in the same vein as the 1992 World Cup.

“The T20 run has been of a piece with, as nobody in Pakistan has forgotten, the 1992 World Cup, where, for no obvious reason, Pakistan suddenly transformed from a mohalla second XI into the world’s best. Everything came together to some great, central magnetic pull, as if it inevitably had to, in a wonderfully calculated way even though almost none of it was calculated,” Osman wrote.

Two days later the comparison had one more thing in common, as they would become the two World Cup victories for Pakistan; a World Cup in 1992 and a T20 World Cup in 2009.

This is a part of the complex soul of Pakistan cricket. Pakistan’s best teams or even the relatively-better ones did not manage to win a big tournament on the World stage. All the other sides were better prepared and well on course compared to the two teams that looked like a mohalla second XI.

The 1992 team and the T20 one in 2009 sensed a ‘tiger coming from the backdoor’ and rode it, though not fully in control but riding it nonetheless—and things started to fall in place. Imran got the right batting order in time and the T20 team started looking confident and dangerous. There were some individual heroes on both the occasions but the essential element was that the force was with all of them.

Younis and his team in the Champions Trophy were openly courting certainty. He declared that the Champions Trophy is Pakistan’s after the first match, leave aside predictions for his own team he even said he would want an India and Pakistan final. They played well but on their own steam. The backdoor probably gets locked in certainty—or who can be sure of even that. One thing though is quite likely as Werner Heisenberg explained in 1927; that the more certain you are about one parameter the greater is the inaccuracy in knowing the other. That’s why in the best traditions of Pakistan to be uncertain is not such a bad thing.

The Glorious Uncertainties of Pakistan Cricket

It would be near impossible to find a genuine cricket lover across the eight major cricketing nations who would not be shattered to see the game moving ahead without a substantial role of Pakistan. On the contrary there would be millions lamenting that tours to Pakistan have suffered for a few years for reasons that are beyond the control of either the administrators or the fans of the game.

In this season even indifferent observers would have turned serious followers had they been witnessing how Pakistan cricket navigated through a dark, treacherous period and emerged joyous and unscathed on the other side; in the process they also sparked unadulterated joy among millions of supporters back home. Forget home; they must be even lifting the spirits of the rival camps.

Younis Khan and his team have given the other Test playing nations enough reason to see the fact that it would be a collective loss for all cricketing nations if tours to Pakistan remain stalled. Tours though are not decided by cricket captains and emotional fans; more so as the aftershocks of Mumbai and Lahore would be felt acutely by the governing bodies of countries scheduled to tour Pakistan.

On their part though, Pakistani cricketers have done enough for the world to take notice. On Wednesday they gave another proof—if it was at all needed in the first place—on why the game of cricket is so much poorer without the incendiary brilliance that their team brings to this rather small mix.

It was not an ideal surface to bat on but it produced a match that single-handedly justified the Champions Trophy. The Aussies put Pakistan in after winning the toss and bowled 50 overs with intensity to restrict Pakistan to 205. The chase began like a typical Aussie hot pursuit, with boundaries raining. At 62 for 2 after 12 overs, the seasoned Ponting and Hussey took charge; Ponting extra cautious while Hussey free-flowing. The Aussie captain perished in the 32nd over—to a slog-sweep off Malik caught wide of square leg, courtesy a great effort by Umar Gul.

It was just a precursor to the period that I call the ‘Pakistan Factor’. This elusive and dangerous quality that makes a Pakistani team lethal is scientifically defined as the product of mass and velocity: commonly called momentum. And in its own peculiar way, this momentum does not run contrary to the Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle*—one of the fundamental pillars of Quantum Mechanics named after the German physicist Werner Heisenberg, who presented it in 1927. In simple cricketing terms it can be used to say that momentum can be observed but what triggers it remains elusive.*

When Pakistan began their World T20 campaign this year, they played England in the first game and lost by 48 runs. A match report said: ‘Pakistan was well short of their best, especially in the field where they dropped at least four catches and produced countless more sloppy pieces of groundwork. … maybe suffered from knowing they have a second chance against the Netherlands …but this defeat was so heavy that even a win in that game might not be enough.’

Pakistan won against Netherlands and then lost to Sri Lanka. They then defeated New Zealand emphatically, and something that can’t be measured accurately triggered what could be seen plainly: Pakistan had gained momentum. Pakistan qualified to the semis as the 4th team to take on the unbeaten South Africans.

Osman Samiuddin, Pakistan editor of Cricinfo, in a preview to the T20 semi-final called it first a clash of ethos, of philosophies and even of time, more than a semi-final. It was the art of cricket against the science of it, cricket’s future against its past.

South Africa had all bases covered. “The whole machinery is intimidating …the mission pre-programmed; with seven consecutive wins… they have also taken the inherent unpredictability of this format out of the equation. They are well-oiled, and their psychologist talks about 120 contests and of processes over outcomes. They win even warm-up matches and the dead games because every game counts. They are cricket’s future.

Pakistan are the past. They are wholly dysfunctional, but just about getting along, though unsure where they are going. They don’t control extras…. They are least bothered about erasing the flaws because any win will be in spite of them. They did hire a psychologist though, and you can only imagine what those sessions were like… There are permanent mutterings of serious rifts. They may not bat, bowl or field well all the time, but sometimes, they do what can only be described as a ‘Pakistan’: that is, they bowl, bat or field spectacularly, briefly, to change the outcome of matches. You cannot plan or account for this as an opponent because Pakistan themselves don’t plan or account for it.”

Osman hits the nail on the head when he says that it is not something that Pakistan plan for; meaning that it happens and also meaning that it is in harmony with my ‘not-so-scientific’ comparison with the revolutionary theory of the Quantum Physics genius Heisenberg.

Pakistan took on South Africa and despite scoring a gettable 149, Afridi turned the game on its head by taking Gibbs and De Villiers cheaply and almost back to back. Sri Lanka had been the more consistent team in the tournament; but in the final it was Pakistan that was more hungry.

Ponting sensed the danger today as his strike rate of 50 suggests; rarely does he score 32 runs in 64 balls. Asif was back in the 40st over after a dull first spell; Ajmal had sent Ferguson back a while ago. Then followed the madness, the brilliance, the call it what you like, the-what I like to call as the Pakistan Factor.

Rana Naved started a new spell in the 41st over and his fifth ball, an in-swinging dipping yorker, shattered Hussey’s off stump; it was as if lightning had struck. Hussey left after a fluent 64; 31 needed from 9 overs with 5 wickets left.

It was already crazy when the back-from-hell Asif made it absolutely maddening in the 42nd over; Hopes drove straight to mid-off and Younis pouched a low catch. Johnson survived a run-out scare; White had no such luck. The fifth ball was an Asif special: It landed on a good length outside the off and cut back sharply to pierce the bat pad gap and shatter the timber behind; an unbelieving pale White made his walk back. Twenty-three in 36 balls with 3 wickets in hand and Rana Naved bowled two maidens on the trot.

In between the maidens Johnson hit a four and was deceived the very next ball by an Ajmal beauty; a short and quick doosra that Johnson misread and it came back to crash his stumps. Australia had needed just 36 runs in the last 10 overs with six wickets in hand. Seven of those 10 overs yielded half of the runs at the cost of 4 Aussie wickets. It was sheer madness, it was pure magic, and it was quintessential Pakistan. It was something that would have made Werner Heisenberg—the 1932 Nobel Prize winner in Physics—smile.

Only Pakistan could have brought Australia to such a desperate situation in an otherwise one-sided contest. And only Australia could have survived a tsunami like that and yet manage to cross the line. If unpredictable is the word for Pakistan then the Aussies can best be summed up as unyielding. Lee and Hauritz saw Australia home in the last ball of the match.

Pakistan now moves ahead with the momentum that makes them so lethal by their side. It would be tempting to put your money on them but it would not be wise: Some things are best left uncertain.

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*Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle states that it is not possible to simultaneously measure both the position and momentum of a particle with precision. Conversly, it also means that more the precision in measuring one of them the greater would be the inaccuracy in measuring the other. There are many ways to define and derive the principle. It is one of the fundamental building blocks of Quantum Theory.

The principle was at the core of dialogues between British physicist David Bohm and the 20th century ‘spiritual thinker’ J. Krishnamurti. Krishnamurti was spotted and raised by The Theosophical Society: which he left saying what remains as his most famous one-liner, ‘Truth is a pathless land’. The dialogues are available in a 1985 published book titled The Ending Of Time. It is the Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle that prompted Albert Einstein’s famous comment, “God does not play dice.”