Is the current one-day team the country’s best-ever? Every time India do well the question is asked, and often answered in the affirmative.
Thus, Kapil Dev’s World Cup-winning squad of 1983, Sunil Gavaskar’s World Championship of Cricket team of 1985, Sourav Ganguly’s World Cup finalists of 2003, Rahul Dravid’s team at the turn of the century which strung together 17 successful chases and Dhoni’s World Cup-winning team of 2011 have all been contenders.
This is because when a team is doing well, it is difficult to imagine that any other could be as good. One of sport’s eternal charms (and pastimes) is pitting one generation’s team against another. How would Kapil’s Devils fare against Dhoni’s Djinns? Or Ganguly’s team against Kohli’s? The fact that we cannot have a definitive answer merely gives rise to arguments — the lifeblood of fandom — and keeps achievements alive for decades.
The ’83 team had a bunch of all-rounders, uncharitably referred to as “bits-and-pieces” players who could bowl a bit, bat a bit and field a bit. Yet somehow the whole was greater than the sum of its parts, and in the final the West Indies were bowled out for 140.
Evolution
By the next World Cup win, 28 years later, the one-day game had evolved. The focus was not so much on all-rounders who might not find a place for any single discipline alone, but on wicket-taking bowlers. Kirti Azad, Madan Lal and Roger Binny had been replaced by Zaheer Khan, Sreesanth and Harbhajan Singh. The best way to cut down the scoring rate, it was divined, was by taking wickets.
In between, the age of spin had dawned, with the young leg spinner L Sivaramakrishnan and left armer Ravi Shastri consistently bowling out teams in Australia to win a tournament there.
The concept of balance in the shorter format is different from balance in Tests. In the latter you had to have a mix of sprinters and long-distance runners, bowlers who can tie one end up and those who have the freedom to buy wickets if necessary. You have the luxury of getting back into the game even after being at the receiving end for most of it.
Everybody has another chance, either because of the two innings involved or because you could start badly and finish strongly. There is room for recovering from mistakes. Plans can be made long-term and the opposition gently led into a trap.
One-day cricket is less forgiving, less likely to give a player a second chance. The ebb and flow of Test cricket is replaced by some desperation, the need to “make things happen”. The scoreboard decides the rate of risk-taking — it can lead to some spectacular cricket or some stunningly puerile displays.
And yet, the shorter format has always aspired to absorb the relative security of the longer game and adapt it to its own frenetic needs. The Formula One racer Niki Lauda once said that the aim of his sport was to win while driving as slowly (and safely) as possible. It is a profound statement, as a moment’s thought will show.
The aim of one-day cricket is similar — to win while taking as few risks as possible. This does not mean you play a boring, calculating game guaranteed to drive the spectators away. It means better risk assessment.
Better understanding of risk
The essential difference between Kohli’s team and past ones is that the modern players have a better understanding of risk, and their game is a better mix of the secure and the perilous. Experience has something to do with this — Mahendra Singh Dhoni and Kohli himself are probably masters here — but instinct and training are just as important.
How many players of the earlier teams would find a place in the current one? Kapil Dev and Sachin Tendulkar certainly, Zaheer Khan and Mohammad Azharuddin probably. What about Sourav Ganguly, Virender Sehwag and Yuvraj Singh?
And what of the reverse? How many from today’s lot would walk into the best teams of the past? Dhoni and Kohli certainly. Then there are a whole lot of “probablies”. For that is the nature of such appraisals —the past records are written in stone, the current figures aren’t blessed by time into permanence. Cricket is full of stories of meteors who shone brightly but briefly before fading away.
Dravid’s team at the 2007 World Cup was seen as the best ever. Three players who would go on to top ten thousand runs and three bowlers finish with over 250 wickets. Yet it was a disastrous outing for India who lost to Bangladesh and Sri Lanka and failed to make it to the Super 8 stage.
India will go into the 2019 World Cup as one of the favourites. A high percentage, if not all of the players there will be from this team. Between now and then the all-time best team will be chosen many times. It will be as much fun to pick a single side which is better than all others. If India win, the choice will become easier.
