Showmanship ends with KP ‘s exit
-Agransh Anand
Ian Botham, the legendary all-rounder,
retired from international cricket in 1992. With him, he took away whatever
flamboyance, charisma, a flair for dominance and stardom that the English side
ever possessed. They did produce a lot of ‘competent’ cricketers thereafter,
but none who could match the aura of Botham. Most of them were ‘wooden’, far
too deep-rooted in the snobbish culture which has gripped England and the England
Cricket Board (ECB) for years now. Too afraid to think out-of-the box, to adapt
with the changing times, too much bound by the code of conduct and punishing
those who didn’t toe the line.
In the summer of 2005, during one of the most
historic test series ever played, against their arch rivals Australia, the home
team was joined by a cricketer named Kevin Pietersen (KP). A tall, lanky
cricketer, with golden streaks of hair, charging down at Shane Warne at the
Mecca of Cricket, Lord’s, didn’t really cut the figure amongst the rest of the
English side. And how could he?
He belonged to the ‘Rainbow Nation’ – South
Africa. As with that country, KP’s personality was as colourful as it could be.
He defied the challenges thrown at him by the Australian bowlers, which
included the likes of McGrath, Warne, Lee, Gillispie – and became the highest
run getter of the series. The overall result of his presence, assisted by some
stunning performances by Simon Jones and Andrew Flintoff, another character in
the English dressing room, was, that England reclaimed the Ashes after a gap of
18 years.
Suddenly the world was taking note of the
aura which had returned to the English side after many-many years. Their own
countrymen, where they still wonder why cricket is their national game in a
soccer frenzy nation, who had lost interest in the growth or decline of their
team, were out on the streets celebrating the home-coming of the Ashes Urn to
their land. The English cricket was not to remain the same afterwards.
With Kevin Pietersen, not only the side
became a threat in the longest format of the game, the opposition was wary of
them even in the shorter formats like ODIs and T20s. It’s of no surprise that
the only ICC silverware they have in their cabinet, World T20 2010, was won
when KP powers were at their peak, and was awarded the Player of the
Tournament. The team’s success rose and fell with KP’s form.
A positive Pietersen in the dressing room
meant that the team would augur well in the field. When one comes to think of
great knocks played in test cricket over the last decade by batsmen world over,
nobody could ignore his innings of 186 against India at a square turner in
Wankhede, Mumbai, 2012. England won the series for first time in India after 28
years. Nor his duel with Dale Steyn at Headingley, Leeds in the same year could
be passed so easily from the memory, where Steyn was pulled and driven around
with aplomb and a match-winning effort against Sri Lanka of 151 at Colombo.
These are just a few of many fine innings
which he played for England. But more than the runs on the scoreboard, it was
the swagger which KP carried with himself. It was the fear of match-is-not-over
till he is around which gave the viewers a high. No other batsman in the
England’s history of last decade had been such a threat or a joy to watch as
this man has been. The likes of Cook and Strauss and Trott etc. have all been
silent accumulators of runs. They had numbers to back their performances. But
so did Pietersen. Rather his were achieved in style and class which none of his
peers could imagine of.
There are always players around in every type
of sport, who should be given a free-hand when it comes to managing them and
including them in your scheme of things. They are not just meant to be bound by
your principles and rules. For when they take the field, and when they get
going, they can put the best of the students of the game to shame and walk back
to pavilion as if it was as normal a day for them in the office as it could
have been, while the world is still gasping at their brilliance. They have
their own battles going during a game and take pride in winning them.
The art of counter-attacking takes a new form
when they transcend into the zone of their own and are unmoved by the presence
of mortals around them. Once they are off the field, normalcy returns to the
ground. In cricket it happens quite often. And its players like KP, Sehwag,
Shoaib, Viv Richards, Lara at times, Gibbs, Flintoff, Donald, Warne, Klusner,
Kohli now, who choose the biggest of the occasions to rise above the rest and
stamp their mark on the game.
You won’t find Sachin or a Kallis or Dravid
or even Ponting , as legendary players as they are, amongst the “showmen” of
the game. They toed the line, rarely stepped out of their comfort zone but
played within the dominion of the game. As exciting as they were to watch,
given a choice between the traditional and the show-stoppers of the game, any
of us would go along with the former set of players mentioned here.
ECB has once again made a blunder of calling
it the end of road for a player like Pietersen. They don’t have many cricketers
who can boast a hefty record of 8000 test runs to go along with 23 hundreds. To
make things worse, they were shown the mirror by an emerging West Indian side a
few days back and even though the scoreline showed series drawn 1-1, it was
England who lost the psychological battle.
Andrew Strauss, Director, ECB, who has some
‘trust issues’ with KP, is hell bent on making things worse for the team, ahead
of a test series against a buoyed New Zealand side. Maybe when they face Trent
Boult’s swingers, they might remember the tall, lanky fellow once again who
could take on the opposition head-on.
Just read somewhere that KP is leaving for
India to join his mates in Sunrisers Hyderabad in IPL. Trust me, many of us who
choose to keep away from watching SRH matches, might just get one reason to
switch on the TV, for the pleasure of watching him bat. England’s loss would be
IPL’s gain. KP might play in a number of leagues around the world and keep
surprising us with his heroics, but it certainly is the “end of Aura, Charisma
& Magnetism”, which he brought along with him to the otherwise boring test
side.
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