India No.1

It is true that Yusuf Pathan and Badrinath have failed pathetically in the past 4 ODI’s when they had golden opportunity to cement their spots in the side. Spots*^#!
If Yuvraj Singh, after 10+ years of mostly impressive international career could not seal a Test spot for himself, I doubt if Yusuf Pathan or Badrinath offer higher quality cricket ahead of him to seal a place even in ODI’s. Let me phrase this in a different way. If Yuvraj Singh is talented enough only to play ODI’s and T20’s then is it safe to assume Badrinath and Yusuf Pathan are talented enough to play only T20’s and domestic cricket?

On the contrary, Harbhajan Singh has not been performing any good for almost a year or two. But his position is never in danger. Surprise is it? Let us dig this issue little deeper.

To me the reason for ordinary performance from Harbhajan is very compelling. His challenge for survival is hardly at stake. Kumble worked hard during the first half of his career to establish him and the second half on toes due to the presence of immensely talented Harbhajan. That actually pushed both of them to work hard and come up with commendable performance for the country. Once Kumble vacated the scene, there was hardly an established talent to push Harbhajan. And so Bhajji turned to be an ordinary cricketer. Mind you, all the Mishras, Chawlas, Ashwins are still fringe players. So these guys have to first establish themselves and then start giving consistent performances to create some threat to Bhajji’s place. Until then an average Bhajji will rule the roaster.

You have to understand, everyone cannot be Tendulkar or Muralidharan with hunger for runs and wickets to keep them going. Different people need different motivation for performance.

Coming back to Yusuf Pathan, he gained a place in the side on the all rounder quota. Ofcourse a failure here is going to chop his head. But for how long you think? However these days Suresh Raina, Rohit Sharma and even Kohli are rolling their arms for a place in the side on the allrounder quota just in case their batting prowess let them down. So this could potentially make the wait little longer. Also Yusuf Pathan may not be good choice for the English and Australian Tour for his bowling talent. In all likelihood his place will be taken over by his half-brother Irfan Pathan whose skills would better suit these conditions.

The story of Badrinath.

In the Test arena Dravid, Laxman and Tendulkar are likely to continue till the Aussie tour. Yuvraj, Kohli, Rohit Sharma, Pujara and Ambati Rayudu are either ahead of Badrinath or along with him in the waitlist. Even he delivers a cracking performance in the WI series he won’t find a regular spot until next year. Many might consider age is not with him (including yours truly in the last post), but in reality he could still get another chance to have a go after the stalwarts move on. The thing is he may not have a long career. After all who had except for the Big 4 in the middle order in the past decade?

After the 70’s and 80’s we witnessed the downfall of WI cricket due to death of talent. After about two decades of reign, we now watched the Aussie downfall for the same reasons.

In reality, all this competition for place is only helping India to prolong its supremacy.

Bottomline: Guess you can phrase it by yourself.

Dinesh

Cricket Lover