Talking Shop: Last sporting chance

“You have to reckon with it

things from you

before you can do them.”

—Michael Jordan

I generally don’t write about sports. I’m only doing this today because the bells are ringing for the Indian men’s cricket team and their players, especially the famous ones. You only have a few months to pull the (c)parrot out of the proverbial hat. I don’t mention pickles, rabbits, pigeons, and other paraphernalia that can be mysteriously hidden in wizards’ headgear and pulled out for a clear cheer; I’ll forget that for a moment.

What I do remember is what happened just last week, making the immediate future for Indian cricket look bleak and abysmal. In the third 50-50 ODI against a dismal Australia in Chennai, India crossed most of the way, but our faithful suddenly decided to display needless bravery and reckless dedication, pathetic indiscipline and sporting immaturity, and handed the plate to a hitherto dejected yellow , beating up our mighty ‘Men in Blue’ within an hour.

Remember, our blue-eyed jocks make more in a month than most of us make in a lifetime, but the nation still adores them. The point is this – the rope stretches too thin for some of these unworthy heroes, perhaps because it was stretched too low for too long. It’s time to pray, not for you or me. Now let her prove her worth to continue living in her chosen, self-anointed and immaculate world. Do not get me wrong. In every game, be it in sports, politics, business or business, someone wins and there is a loser. But let’s not turn part-time wannabes into confident and proclaimed achievers, zealots who look in the mirror and see superheroes in the shiny reflection.

dangerous times

I’m being trolled for writing this, but so be it. Before you reach for your mobile devices to condemn me for my words, think of our fathers, mothers and previous generations, most of whom struggled to provide for us and give us a good education. In doing so, they buried their personal dreams of their own Bajaj scooter or an Ambassador car. That’s how life was, and that’s how life still is. The average Indian Premier League (IPL) player earns around Rs 3-4 crore per year through his three year contract, with the board also paying handsome sums to the athlete. Luckily the women’s teams have also started making delicious money and I’m glad. It is time that we move beyond mere lip service and slogans and start implementing equality of rights and benefits, sporting or otherwise.

Let’s talk about hockey, kho kho and soccer players in India still earning next to nothing unless you are a Baichung Bhutia in soccer. In sports like gymnastics or javelin, unless you are a Dipa Karmakar from Tripura or Neeraj Chopra from Haryana, you are subjected to dingy practice areas and dirty toilets; pure second-hand treatment. Remember ‘Chak de India’– a re-run of India’s victorious women’s ice hockey team at the 2002 Commonwealth Games, which inspired screenwriter Jaideep Sahni to make a film about the team and their achievements? Sahni modeled Kabir Khan (played by Shah Rukh Khan) on ice hockey coach Maharaj Krishan Kaushik.

Let’s accept it. So life is. That is perhaps why today’s earners need to give an answer to yesterday’s yearning, if only to justify and explain their burgeoning fortunes. They can do this simply by fulfilling their delayed promises of being superhuman. Tattoos and bangs are beautiful; Performance on the field would be nicer. Or the end is near. It’s time to turn the bat into the bait and a ball into the bait when we talk about cricket.

Yesterday’s superstars

Think of the sporting superstars of yesteryear and I won’t name their names because I adore them far too much to humiliate them in such a mediocre column. I’ve seen former Test cricket openers queuing for milk at 6am in Mother Dairy branches. I’ve seen benefit games that were only held to raise funds for life-saving medical treatments they can no longer afford. I interviewed some who are now selling vegetables and plastic cups in the slums of Delhi to feed their families.

I spoke to a famous Indian wrestler in 1989 who represented India in two categories at the 1964 Summer Olympics. At 11am I found him drunk asleep in front of his abandoned fruit truck in a Delhi slum, with less than a quarter of his once impressive musculature. When he woke up he started crying and told me his heart was broken and devastated – he knew a street was named after him in Delhi but he had no way of providing for his family. A year after I interviewed him, he moved to a better place. Good for him, given the circumstances.

For the same story, in 1989, for a leading newspaper, I interviewed India’s then-leading horseman, a former Asian Games contender who had been demoted to manager of a seedy hotel in Delhi’s Pahar Ganj neighborhood, just across from New Delhi’s railway station. For those in the know, this is an area marred by drugs, shady dealings and a shadier life. He was crying too. In 1989 and for the same story, I found only one athlete who was doing well – a badminton champion who was then a professor of physical education at Jawaharlal Nehru University. I played her at JNU and beat her by a hair’s breadth (maybe just because she was more than twice my age at the time). This is how immortals are born, but this is how they spend their golden years. I can share their names with anyone who wants deeper insights.

Why this thought?

Well, because the discrepancy is heartbreaking and unacceptable. Our old sports stars should not be forgotten, just as new wannabes should not be celebrated until they make an indelible and unforgettable impression on their chosen turf. Since we started the column with men’s cricket, we’ll end with our gentlemen. I wish our “Men in Blue” the best of luck in the next two upcoming World Cup matches; the finals of the Test World Championship and the one-day International World Championship. At ODIs, Kap’s Devils and then Dhoni and his hatters got us through, once each in 1983 and 2011. In the Test Cricket World Cup arena at the Oval from 7th June 2023 we have an opportunity to make amends.

Either way, the celebrations will begin—win or lose, as long as we play and do things with poise, dignity, and grace. After all, it’s just sport. An old Japanese proverb called Kintsugi says combine everything that breaks gold, if only to create something bigger, better, more valuable and respected. We need now Kintsugi in our ranks; be it political, spiritual, religious or moral, and believing in ourselves. Because as Lady Jessica Ennis-Hill once said, “The only one who can tell you you can’t win is you, and you don’t have to listen.” Not.

The author is an experienced journalist and communications specialist. He can be reached at [email protected]. The views expressed are personal