Ganguly Issue: Overblown?
Ok, let me admit straight up that I think the selectors were wrong in dropping Ganguly. He deserved another chance after making 79 in the 2 innings at Delhi. Give the man one final run - if he flounders, that’s the end of his career; if he gets runs, well, then good for the team, right? And mind you, he has been kept in the team for like 2 years just for captaincy - his last 2 years have yielded hardly anything meaningful from his bat.
Now coming to the real issue at hand: politics in the BCCI. Right. Like it’s anything new. The BCCI has always had people who were politicians along with being administrators. Dalmiya has always been one and now we have Sharad Pawar. Guess what, he is a POLITICIAN!!! Surprise!! People seriously have nothing to do it seems. First protestors took to Kolkata’s streets to voice their disagreement. Agreed that Ganguly shouldn’t have been dropped, it was the selectors’ decision and you ought to respect it. Ganguly never said anything about the issue - it’s just people with nothing better to do shouting slogans. People from Kolkata have always been a passionate bunch. They love their cricket but at the same time, they cannot stand anything that doesn’t go according to plan. Remember the 96 World Cup semi-final? The India-Pakistan test match? And recently the India-SA game? Yes, Ganguly has done great things for India in the past. But it is time to move on. One cannot keep riding on past performances. Now before you start saying that others like Sachin aren’t as good as they were earlier, please check the stats. Sachin has done way better than Ganguly and is more than capable of producing scintillating and/or meticulous innings fairly often. And also, nowadays, when Ganguly gets runs, he gets them at painfully slow strike-rates. He is fighting for survival but he cannot jeopardize the team’s chances. And now Somnath Chatterjee says that he will bring up the Ganguly issue in the Parliament. You want to keep politics out of cricket? Well, raising the issue in the Parliament is great way to do it - what with 500+ politicians sitting together. Or better yet, why not let Sharad Pawar & Jagmohan Dalmiya be elected? They’re great people to keep politics out.
While many past cricketers have expressed their support for Ganguly, it’s only Bengali politicians that have supported him outside of cricket. Regional bias anyone?
Furthermore, Mr. Sharad Pawar doesn’t even know all 15 players. Does he even know what cricket is all about? Why did he run for BCCI President? Perhaps to embezzle some of the truck loads of money that the BCCI makes each year. High time that past cricketers and able administrators took control of the BCCI. Do away with 5 selectors from 5 different regions.
I might add more here as the issue develops. Right now, I’m too tired and need to sleep.
Well, no one can deny the politics going on in the BCCI but what hon. Mr. Sharad Pawar says is ‘ I have been associated with Sports for 30 yrs now and I know how to keep sports and politics away from each other’ Nice to hear that isnt it ?
Sports & Politics doesn’t look nice together. A player when thinks that his place in the team is fixed even if he isn’t playing well, then he needs a treatment. No need to make such an issue out of it.
Well yes,
Imagine it is going to be discussed in the parliment! Yeah now they don’t get paid questions so this is all they have left to discuss in the parliment.
Well as far as Ganguly goes he had been out of form for long time. Even though he is the most successful captian of India let’s face it!! SHIT HAPPENS!!
..:: peace ::..
Jeba
I belive that a public outcry was required in this issue.However, yes some people did get carried away.He didnt deserve to be dropped in the tests.Esp when in spite of being under tremendous pressure he had played a couple of innings.You mentioned the appaling strike rate but you forgot to mention the pitch (slow and low) and sri lankan bowling.Remember he had played during the last session and the first session of the day.In the last session people play to ensure that they dont loose another wicket just before stumps.And the first hour of the day is always difficult.
Also Ganguly knew very well that if he didnt perform in that test then it would mean an end to his career.There was that enormous pressure.
He was showing signs of regaining touch.And thats when he was dropped.If his stay in the wicket was a couple of steps forward for him the selectors pushed him 4 steps backwards.This must be devastating for his confidence and trust in the selectors and team management.
Btw, I belive that several political parties including RJD has expressed their concern over this issue.
Yep I mentioned that he didn’t deserve to be dropped. And it wasn’t his strike-rate just in the second test - I was talking about his recent performances over the past year or so. Besides, I firmly believe that there was absolutely no need for the public protests that broke out. Surely these people had something better to do than go around burning effigies and shouting slogans? For what? Just because a player was dropped doesn’t mean you take to the streets in protest. And if Ganguly wants to return, he will prove his mettle in the domestic league and fight his way back. If he does make it back in, he should be a stronger individual and hopefully a better batsman.
take the case of Steve Waugh too, he was shunted out even though he was scoring.
as far as Sourav Ganguly is concerned, it’s just politics, nothing else. As he would’ve realised by now, it’s bad being associated with the defeated team (read: Jagmohan Dalmiya)
all the people in kolkata have not been shouting slogans and burning effigies thank you very much……it were just a few protests signifying the dissatisfaction of the people……….the regional ‘bias’ you keep talking about is love and besides who else would show their emotions for sourav …there are many supporters across the country who support him but they cannot do this in their states as their own politicians want players from their own states to flourish……. they look upon this as an opportunity to promote their own states.this regional divide is harming the country and i think ganguly’s good performances in the ranji trophy and in the second test is good enough reason to be selected.the selectors selected him as an allrounder first because they couldn’t ignore his centuries in domestic cricket…..then they dropped him after scoring at an avg of 40 in the second test as he didn’t score a century….i for one expected it as they have poltical and personal bias against ganguly………and if ganguly needed treatment,resting him for a couple of matches would have sufficed.greg chappell is a great teacher of the game but remember his first impression left on the players (they won’t say it now coz they’ll lose their place in the team)-he was accused of dividing the team.