Recently, Harbhajan Singh made a statement that this is the weakest Australian side to tour India. After India’s dismal batting performance in the first innings of the Pune Test, there is a question mark over Singh’s assessment of the visiting team. However, the off spinner says, he stands by his statement. “When you make a wicket like this, you make the conditions favourable for the opposition as well. The point I am making is that if we play on good wickets, we are a better side. With good wicket I mean where the Test match lasts for five days, where the ball shoots up only on fourth and fifth day,” says Singh during a telephonic conversation about his joining the new season of MTV Roadies as a mentor. “On tracks like these, toss becomes vital, which should not be the case,” adds the off spinner. Indian has successfully batted second this season. Singh says, it was against weaker opposition and the risk with this plot is that it could backfire.
Singh admits that the present Australian side has quality players like Warner and Smith but argues that our spinners are definitely better than theirs. “But that’s on a good track. Here the track is so bowler-friendly that a rather unknown bowler captured six wickets. There are only two possibilities. Either Steve O’ Keefe has become a quality spinner overnight or the wicket helped him a lot.” Singh recalls the 2004 Test series against Australia where in the Mumbai Test, Michael Clarke captured six wickets in the second innings. “That haul didn’t make him a quality bowler.”
On his association with Roadies, Singh says he likes to connect with the youth. “I felt I could give some advice to participants on mental and physical strength. I like the concept of the show. It is a show where there are no recordings. The tasks are live. It is not a cut-paste job as we see in many other reality shows. This time during selection if we had to select 50 contestants, 30 are those who are tailor-made for the show. The rest are completely novice, anari hain. They have come to the show because they are passionate about becoming Roadies. I identify with such guys as I can say from my personal experience that only those people succeed who are passionate about their dream. My job is to turn them from anaris to khiladis. Whatever I am, is because of my passion. Your hard work and luck can take you to a high but to stay there you got to be passionate about what you do.”
After a break, the Turbanator is now gearing up for the domestic season. “My aim to is make it to the national side for the ICC Champions Trophy in June.”
