The enigma that is Dada

So, after a couple of sentimental outpourings it is back to my core competency. If you reckon that a decent grade score (on the donward spiral all the time) makes me a talented or even an interested 'Mechaniche', nothing could be farther from the truth. It is back to my comfort zone and back to a person who has probably intrigued me the most, myself apart.

The ephemeral Yorkshirean still calls him the "Bengal Tiger" or the "Prince who could smash spinners out of the park with my grandma's broomstick". Shane Warne and Steve Waugh remember him as "an irritant" who had the audacity to look the Aussies into the eye and keep people waiting at the toss. Freddie Flintoff calls him a "royal" who never practised and took cricket as a pastime but would still celebrate (showing off a muscular frame) as if he had won matches on his own. In the eastern parts of India, he is God and held on the same pedestal as Durga. In any dressing room, he is called Dada with a mixture of respect, envy and intrigue.

Fascinating!

No person has captivated the public conscience in recent times for his methods and actions as much as Sourav Chandidas Ganguly has. Not even Shane Warne. When you do a personality check with Warney, you wonder about this fuss. This guy doesn't smoke, neither does he get watered down and create trouble at places, nor does he get hooked up with all handsome looking females that he comes across. But the cynosure of all eyes nevertheless!

His roll of honour includes over 15000 international runs, 150 international wickets and100 international catches. But one suspects that Sourav Ganguly will be remembered more for his bare-chested celebrations, his verbal ding-dongs with the Aussies, his ability to infuriate the opposition, his perceived 'rudeness' to the Srinaths (At a crucial moment in the Trinidad test, he was caught by cameras gesticulating to Srinath besides abusing him), for thinking that Kumble was a good option as 12th man, for his candidness but at the same time his remarkable ability in not getting bogged down even under the extremest of situations.

His trademark punches through the off-side (which had Dravid claiming , ''through the off-side, first there is God, then there is Sourav") will be missed, his characteristic jig down the track at the first sight of a spinner will be missed and his dismantling of the quickest bowlers in the world in manners never seen before will be missed as well. So will his fielding with only one serious competitor- Inzamam.

He will be remembered for introducing Sehwag Yuvraj, Harbhajan, Dhoni and Pathan to world cricket. He will also be remembered as the captain who got his bowlers to bowl straight by instating Rahul Dravi as wicketkeeper, for prolonging Jumbo's career but at the same time cutting down that of the Mysore Express. He defied logic by getting Sehwag to open in Test cricket; having specialist batsmen to bat at No.8 in one-day cricket; preferring Dinesh Mongia and Sanjay Bangar to Laxman in a World Cup squad; winning test matches in Australia, England and the West Indies and reaching a World Cup final with a side not having an all-rounder, a specialist fast bowler, a wicket-keeper or a wrist spinner.


My take on Dada doesn't match up to the intrigue of the man. A middle class Bengali with a beatiful celeb wife plus a comfortable livelihood, I beleive has got more to do with his downfall than anything else. At the end of it all, Sourav will look back at his career with the greatest tinge of regret. Greatness was always just a step away but for some strange reason, he always shunned that step trying to get the entire team there. I feel that there came a point in time when Dada got so engrossed about how his 'Men in Blue' were doing that he lost sight of the fact that he was a batsman blessed with great talent but weaknesses manifold and that the opposition would always come hard at him.

To crucify him for that would be unfair, for Sourav I thought, always looked at ways to get the most a bunch which was very limited in talent. Greg offered him a way out by offering him a way out of the captaincy and back to the nets but the proud middle class Bengali in him surfaced and he took it as a personal affront. Over the last few years, one couldn't but help get the feeling that Ganguly started overestimating his abilities as a batsman. His best efforts, be it in England or in the West Indies had been exercises in dogmatism, perseverance and determination more than the brutesque power, timing and lazy elegance that had always been his trademarks. When in the late 90's he was the most realiable outfielder and slipsman, here he was- an embarassment to modern day athleticism. When he was a safe bet as third seamer in the late 90's with match-winning spells in the longer format, here he was, trying to match Kumble on the speed gun.

Ganguly, for me, will have to go down in history books, as the captain who transformed the way India played cricket and how the world looked at India as a cricketing nation; the finest Indian left-hand batsman; the best all rounder India has seen in one day cricket after Kapil and Sachin; a fierce competitor who hated losing and instilled pride, aggression and respect in Indian cricket. Gone were the quota systems and the laidback approach that had been the bane of Indian cricket.

On a global stage, I beleive, Dada will be put in the bracket of the Flemings and Gowers in terms of batsmanship, undoubted ability with brilliance in spurts whenever one doubted, lazy elegance and a blessed sense of timing. I do beleive that Sourav had more weaknesses than the other two; both were fine players of the short-pitched stuff and equally comfortable off their legs, but just the fact that Sourav got there is a tribute to his mental strength and dogmatism.

As for the World Cup, my call is that Dada will have a pretty barren spell. A string of low scores with a gem or two interspersed in between might not be the best way for 'The Prince' to bid adieu to 'his' stage, but it would be so unlike the man and his career if he went out as per his whims. Sourav has had his opportunities but he has never been able to chart his own course or destiny.

That is how history will define him- a great captain and a damn good cricketer.