Retirement of Dravid and Laxman has created a void in the dressing room
V.V.S. Laxman was a cricketer’s cricketer; Rahul Dravid a captain’s. When Laxman batted, cricketers set work aside and watched.
He was such a delight. Dravid’s work at the crease gave the captain his most relaxed phases. There was surety in Dravid’s batting and artistry in Laxman’s.
Their absence is hurting Indian cricket. Both took conscious decisions to bow out in glory rather than fade away in distress. It was “tough and difficult” for Laxman and Dravid as they decided to retire and accept new roles.
Their legendary match-winning feats have been well documented and narrated time and again, but their departure also created a void in the dressing room. The team lost two complete batsmen, who could not only bat to win but also bat to draw.
As good as a win
In times when the stress on result in Tests is so overwhelming, it was once an achievement if the team could force a draw against strong opponents. There were all kinds of drawn encounters. The exciting draw, like when the tail-enders (Shivlal Yadav, 28 balls and Karsan Ghavri, 36 balls) hung on to pull off a pulsating draw against Australia at Adelaide in 1981. It was as good as a match won.
There was also the dull draw when teams batted only one innings each and then there was the DDD (dull, dreary, draw) when the spectators found nothing palatable even on the fourth day. The art of drawing a match is gradually becoming a thing of the past.
When India was confronted with a deficit of 207 runs at the Eden Gardens, the only option left for the home team was to bat for a draw.
A victory was highly improbable. The team would have had to bat four sessions. “Quite possible,” Dravid remarked on television. Obviously he had forgotten he was not in the squad anymore. If anyone had the tenacity to put his hand up and guide the rest, it would have been Dravid.
Batting is not just about scoring runs. It also involves wearing down the attack. “Grinding” as Dravid would say.
For Laxman, batting meant domination in the middle, scoring at will, taming the bowlers with a judicious mix of aggression and caution. Dravid was an able foil at the other end, making runs with unwavering concentration. The current team lacks the tenacity that Dravid and Laxman brought to the middle.
There is a match-winner in Virender Sehwag. However, he knows just one way to bat. It would not work in his favour if Sehwag were to change his style and be defensive. He would get out quickly. Just as Dravid had analysed his batting once sensibly. He accepted he could not bat like Sehwag or Sourav Ganguly, strokeful both, because he would “get out” cheaply.
So, Dravid, to serve the interests of the team better, evolved into an anchorman even though he was a brilliant strokeplayer in his formative years of international cricket. Indian cricket benefited immensely from his rock-like presence.
Laxman had a distinct style. It was not one-dimensional, hit the ball, play shots constantly. No. He had a tight defence and employed it doggedly when the going got tough. His technique was second to none when facing spinners or the fast bowlers in hostile conditions. He could smother the spin, the ball not straying out of the square, and frustrate the fast bowlers with his impeccable judgment of leaving the ball.
Experts believe the art of leaving the ball has diminished considerably in modern cricket because of the two shorter formats of the game. Batsmen tend to poke and nudge out of habit.
Cheteshwar Pujara comes closest to becoming the anchorman, but he has not understood his role fully regardless of the two centuries in this series. He is yet to be tested in severe conditions and in any case he is not even remotely close to being counted as the man for crisis. To expect him to slip into Dravid’s role would be unfair. These are early times and Pujara has a long way to go.
India sorely missed the likes of Dravid and Laxman at the Eden Gardens as the Englishmen inflicted a Test defeat in succession, the former would have shut out the bowlers and the latter slammed them into submission.
With Sachin Tendulkar going through a most forgettable phase of his career, the team has failed to cope with the pressures in the middle order.
Former India captain Anil Kumble had suggested a re-look at Mohammad Kaif, who has the temperament to bat long like Chetan Chauhan and Yashpal Sharma did in days when sometimes a draw would give no less joy than a victory. India is sorely missing a batsman who can ‘stand and defy’.
Keywords: England's tour of India, India, cricket, V.V.S. Laxman, Rahul Dravid
One can have either T20 or Cricket, sadly India chose T20, where is the
incentive for cricketers to master the game?
Dravid and Lakshman are the matadors of test cricket for india and all we now have are a bunch of IPL cowboys who are out for shoot to kill, which is not the ideology for test cricket. You have to run down the opposition attack like a matador does to the bull and then go for the kill. Dependency on senior players is fine but cannot depend on one or two players. Openers are key to any match and for the test thay are the double important. Gautam and Viru are good but are not putting up their best show which they must.
Good to see Pujara standing tall amidst the rubble, should keep the good work going. Also Ashwin wass brilliant in the second test match, we need tailenders to follow such examples.
We should bring in Dravid and Lakshman as advisors to help out our guyz a little as they have played on all test tracks in India and have all know hows to deal with such pitches and situations.
We should focus more on building such players rather than looking for someone who can fill the spot. We may not find a perfect match or even close enough match for the likes of Laxman or Dravid. Focus must rather be on building the talent pool we have. Identifying players who can fill the spot and pushing them is the way forward.
Selection process must be made more transparent. And it must be made systematic eg. say giving more weightage to performance in domestic test cricket and lesser to performance in IPL. Also some rating system only for Indian players which measures the performance of players. Anyone falling below a certain level must be sacked immediately. So much money they are getting,that only puts more responsibility on them to perform.
There are too many prima donnas in the Indian test team who are probably only fit for the ODI and Twenty-20 teams, but not the test team. They need to be replaced and decent players found. The current team does not have the mental strength for the longer format of Cricket. Players like Sehwag, Kohli, Dhoni, Yuvrag are basically ODI or 20-20 players. Most of the players are not motivated enough, they have got lots of money and are happy with their lot. You need really gutsy fighters in the test arena, unfortunately the Indian test team has very few of them at the moment.
Absolutely true that the departure of Dravid, Laxman and Kumble has created a void. But, it is time Indian cricket needs new players and experimenting with new players is the only to find a replacement.
Of course, Badrinath and Pujara are nice to have in the team.
BCCI should ask test players not to take part in T20 as it is destroys the cricket.
Selection for Test matches must be on the basis of performance in Ranji and Duleep trophy tournaments. It cannot be from 20-20 tournaments or the IPL. A close look at the present Indian cricket team will immediately reveal that it has no grinders but only stroke makers barring Pujara. Each time India has been in a lot of trouble we have men like Kohli, Yuvraj and Dhoni arriving at the wicket.These men have got their accolades mainly in the shorter format of the game. The BCCI is responsible for this with their eyes only for the financial bottom line. They couldn't care less for India as long as the coffers keep getting filled up.
Inspite of all the means & measures available with BCCI , in terms of
money & infrastructure, the pathetic show put up by Indian cricketers
gives us a thought that domestic cricket grooming infrasture should be
revamped. Otherwise we will be facing such defeats.
The excessive playing in shorter format is a worry, but people have to be more balanced about it. We simply cannot do away with the IPL. There is also a definite lack of talent, which is one of the biggest reasons. Sachin, Dravid and Ganguly also played the shorter formats excessively, but they had both the talent and the technique to change their games when needed.
A good example of this was Sachin between the 2nd and 3rd tests. He got out playing twice across the line to Monty in Mumbai, once off the front foot and once off the back. He put that shot away in Kolkata while scoring the 76. Yet, Gambhir continues to try and run the ball down to third man and Kohli and Yuvraj play with huge backlifts and forget where their off stump is. Just a lack of talent and ability to adapt!
Badhrinath is the player to fill this gap after retirements of Dravid &
VVS. He played only 2 test.
First of all, its a shame right on the Indian cricketers faces that they are helpless and hopeless against any team in any country in any pitch. One of the biggest reasons for this is T-20 cricket. Even the god-like maestro Sachin Tendulkar must be blamed for this. Even he clearly knew that T-20 cricket would ruin Test cricket and yet participated actively in it. If 'God' did that, others would also definitely do that and the whole team is pathetic in producing quality test cricket. Another one reason is the 'Test Captaincy' of M.S.Dhoni. Come on, Rajnikanth is a super star of commercial cinemas,but he knows his style and never gets himself into period or drama movies. M.S.Dhoni should also have followed it. He is not at all fit to be even in the Test team,never mind being the Captain and leading 10 players. He is good in T-20s and ODIs and must restrict himself to it. Lastly, we can give the famous excuse about'restructuring the team' as 2 big valuable senior players have left.
India missing Laxman and Dravid in batting and the never die spirit of Anil Kumble in the
bowling dept. Three great cricketers left on their terms and left a void.
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