Indian Cricket And Sourav Ganguly

Indian Cricket and Sourav Ganguly: A Tribute A phenomenon, a mystery, an enigma wrapped in history, an exemplar- almost like wartime general, a maverick-all of it and much more was Sourav Chandidas Ganguly. Most of us who grew breathing the fresh air of cricket were never used to aggression on the cricket field. After all, cricket was a gentleman’s game, India boasted of great spinners but no tearaway fast bowlers and of course, Hinduism is a tolerant, catholic religion. So we were humble, docile and mildly submissive. One man along with a bunch of young confident boys changed it all. It was a generation that had grown up watching India occupy the world stage. India had turned global. The oozing confidence had spilled over and cricket was no exception; after all cricket was a part of the social cosmos of India. Sourav Ganguly symbolized and embodied it all. He was a leader who led by example. An exemplar of self-belief, confidence, and zest. He was unconventional, unpredictable and approached divinity on the off side. When he took over the reigns of Indian cricket on 10th November 2000, exactly 8 years before the day of his retirement, Indian cricket was like the Indian nation in the eighties and West Bengal in perpetuity- full of opportunities, talent and

immense potential- but rudderless. Sourav provided the perfect rudder. Parts often do not combine in a fashion that makes the whole better than the sum total of the parts. But if there is a certain Sourav Ganguly at the helm-the whole comes out carved, chiselled and done up to perfection. True, he had a bunch of exceptionally talented cricketers at his disposal, but a Roosevelt is needed for the New Deal, Keynes had been there since long! The most seminal of all the contributions of Dada would be- not that he was amongst the best ODI batsmen the world has ever seen, not that he defied all canons of gentlemanliness and indicated that the Mecca of cricket had shifted from the elitist portals of Lords to the gullies of Mumbai, Baroda and Allahabad, not that he was elegance personified on the off-side, no that he was the cleanest of all the hitters of the red cherry, not that his dancing down the track and hitting those towering sixes would leave us all swooning, with a desire to watch it endlessly and untiringly, not that he was a bundle of controversies and that being misunderstood came to him as easily as gulping Macher Jhol, but that he revolutionized the way Indian cricket was played and viewed till then, that he brought back the faithfuls, the believers, that he provided aggression, self-belief and

confidence unheard of, that he emphasized and underlined the importance of leadership in team building, that he showed us all how to tide over the most difficult of times and come out shining as never before, that he gave to Indian cricket-“Team India”.His departure has left a void, a vacuum, which only he can fill; a thirst, a desire that only he can fulfil; a blank, a space that only he can occupy. We all have fought over the best movies, the best hero, the most beautiful heroine, and so on, but nothing can beat the heat generated when it came to Tendiya or Dada, the best of the friends turned into the worst of the foes, the voices grew louder and the discussions lost logic, passion took over reason and battle lines were drawn. All that wouldn’t be there anymore. Emotions by there very internal logic are illogical and this is one of them. He was for all of us mad caps an integral part of our existence. Cricket functionally became a religion-something, somewhere to fall back upon when the going went tough, a source of strength and rejuvenation and Ganguly was the saviour of all our hopes-be it the wonderful century at Adelaide against Pakistan when Wasim Akram wrote in a piece in TOI that Ganguly was more dangerous than Tendulkar, or the series defining century at Brisbane or the heavenly 183 at Taunton, when even Muralidharan looked ordinary or infact any one of those incandescent off drives or the

impetuous sixes. All these constituted not an experience that was objective and dispassionate, but one that was absolutely existential and organic. We were not merely viewers but participants, not merely spectators but a part of the game. We would go to any length- from bunking school and coaching classes, feigning stomach ache, missing home work, forsaking many Casual Leaves by not attending mandatory Yoga classes at the IRS academy, and of course producing false medical certificates. The thin line between morality and immorality got even thinner. All lies were indeed innocent ones. We lived our passion, we lived our life. Henceforth, it will be all be too routine. Icons after all are not born daily. Thanks Ganguly, Thanks Cricket!