Cricket World Cup 2007: India's Loss to Sri Lanka - What Now for Indian Cricket?

Okkk this is for all you Desi Critics who stayed up late to watch our team try so hard to lose to Lanka...thank you for those updates gentlemen....would love to see your faces now...after the licking our over-rated players got.

This Edition of the World Cup has been overshadowed by the murder of Bob Woolmer....and now the exit of the Indian Team from the World Cup.

Sambit Bal writing for Cricinfo has put it succinctly when he says..."..... it is quite likely that Woolmer was a victim of cricket's seamier side. Either it was the stress, induced by the most obscene and blind expectations of cricket fans who brook no failure, or he was killed by people who felt let down or had something to fear.

Either way, it should serve as a wake-up call to those who run cricket, and those who profess passion for it. If a game starts taking lives, there is something sickeningly wrong with it. But this is not really about Woolmer. We didn't need someone to die to awaken us to a problem. The signs have always been there, it's just that most of us have found it expedient to ignore them. Commodification has been chipping away at the soul of cricket for years, and now the game is the danger of losing its head.

Take the current predicament of this World Cup as an example. The major stake-holders in the tournament - the television channels and major sponsors - risk losing millions, either in cash or kind, if India go out in the first round. They are not the number one team in the world by a mile. Not even number two. They are ranked sixth in the ICC team ratings and, while that might not always be the best indicator of a team's worth, they have not won a competition of note outside the subcontinent since 1985. Yet the fate of the World Cup rides on them. It's a disaster waiting to happen.

....The passion of the fans is the biggest strength of cricket in the sub-continent - but it is also its weakness, particularly in case of India and Pakistan. Sri Lankan fans are far more stoic about their team's fortunes and far more accepting of failure, whereas in Bangladesh they are grateful for every little or big victory, be that of the team or As an Indian, I would like India to win the World Cup. But it might not be such a bad thing for cricket if they were to be knocked out in the first round.

....In India it is brazenly and cynically fueled by an increasingly sensationalist and populist mass media, which treats cricket as one of the biggest baits to attract advertisers. Instead of providing perspective and being the voice of reason, the media feeds the frenzy and cashes in on it. Stars are built up and decimated. Exaggerated glorification is matched by proportionate vilification. So cricketers are either to be worshipped or denigrated. There isn't a middle ground, a measure of reality, or a sense of proportion.

....The reality is that India reaching the World Cup final would be an overachievement. Australia and South Africa possess superior teams, New Zealand have more balance and depth and Sri Lanka are the most improved team in world cricket. India have proven, but ageing, batsmen, a bowling attack that's susceptible to pressure and poor fielders. To be a fan is to dream. But to many Indian fans the dream is the reality.

......As an Indian, I would like India to win the World Cup. But it might not be such a bad thing for cricket if they were to be knocked out in the first round. Cricket needs a reality check. It has an unhealthy, and unsustainable, business model that relies primarily on an increasingly delusional and one-dimensional fan-base. The bubble has to burst for a semblance of sanity to be restored. We must learn to once again enjoy cricket as a game...."


Now that bubble has burst ..the fortunes of this Indian team have plunged faster than Mandira Bedi's neckline..like Aaman put it..."Gone baby Gone".....except that in the Indian Team's case it doesn't make for pretty viewing......

anybody still want to stay up late to watch cricket?

Very, VERY well said, Mr. Menon! (And no, I didn't stay up last night) High time the one billion citizens of this nation got a life!

Mr Menon, if that was an article, you wouldn't have to paste it again. Well-put, btw

CRICKET, cricket, CrIcKeT

I think, all educated cricket fans in India, should reason out with the present day's situation, like many players are involved in match fixing, many teams involved in big money with the bookies, many killings happening, many politicians taking charge of cricket boards, because of power & big money handling, the present day cricketer getting much much more than he deserves,etc. etc. should try to put an end to all this.

We should first think of our country India's development & cricket is a very big hurdle in the way of our own development. Many man hours are lost. A lot of productive time is wasted. A lot of betting & gambling is taking place. Many innocent people are also losing a lot of money. Let all the educated community, take up this responsibility of educating the lay man about all this rubbish & set a new trend to encourage all other sports, which really needs a helping hand.

I agree with u prasad.. you are right

Too much experimenting for the indian coach. He should quit his job as a coach. If we have players like tendulkar, saurav and sehwag.. why robin utthapa was asked to open the innings.. this make some bloody sense thinking of preserving the good players for the rest of the game and hoping someone to play the opening innings. Tendulaker and ganguly has lots of runs in their opening belt then why they keep on experimenting this shit. Whereas Robin Utthapa was not playing well in the two games, why pathan had not been given a chance. He quite showed his potential in the warm up match against the west indies... This is really horrible.. indian cricket team desparetely needs a break

The team failed because they did not play well. 8 of the players who played today also played the last world cup final...new players will come on the show will go on....

The so called 'fans' who go breaking stuff and burning effigies are unemployed youth.


Let us no get too excited about one world cup exit and draw major conclusions....

Indi was out of the 1999 world partially due to a early loss to ZIM....nothing new for us.....We went on to enter the 2003 final


The only thing that I learnt from this defeat was that we need to build greater accountability of the BCCI. I dont see them having a great system for

a. Identifying young talent
b. Coaching them to world standards (like the Australian cricket Academy)
c. A mix of pitches in India to ensure players learn to bat and bowl on varied conditions.

Lastly, some of the current team should on their own initiative leave the team to allow for younger players to come in - SCG-SRT-RD-AK....

We will be fine Sambit......Thank you so much....


rgds

Painful as this early exit is, there is a part of me which senses some good coming out of it.

Bingo! I was thinking of the same. This may actually be a blessing for Indian cricket. There must be some sort of paradigm shift in the way we play our cricket. We had every damn thing we need to win a World Cup this time... a great coach, superb players, good physios, psychologists, a billion peoples' support etc. but something was lacking.

Whatever it is, I'd like to see one thing changed and improved -> our domestic cricket. We need a massive overhaul. We should make our domestic cricket highly competitive and as good as international cricket like in England and Australia.

I agree with all of the opinions which have been posted.

Very importantly, media and most importantly ad-generators must be separated from Indian cricketers. Because of getting more-than-deserved earnings, our cricketers cannot be motivated for playing a true cricket game.

Whenever and wherever they are playing, they must know that they are representing India and billions of Indians.

Proud To Be Indian

Indian- Your argument is not based on sound facts

We missed Mandira Bedi's(lady) luck :) Looking right now at the way Aussies are batting against SA, I wonder what India lacks or has problem with? Well it is not only lack of passion or ageing team or poor captaincy or bad coach? Naaahh...Indians lack technique too. The game has changed so much and teams like Australia have adapted to it very well and now they are the pioneers. Mind you Australia was not the team to bring about the change of 100 runs in 15 overs. They didn't start this with openers like Mark greatbatch, Jayasuriya, Kallu or even Sachin tendulkar. Still they are able to adjust to that kind of game and produced openers like hayden and adam gilcrist. They did not stop there (where most others). Australia took the game to a new level where Players like Ponting coming at number 3 is even more dangerous. They had players like beven who had an average in 60's or 50's and a marvelous finisher, still had to retire to give way to youngsters. India is nowhere near the new level of the game. It needs major overhaul. On a laughing note, why not a fixed retirement age for cricketers?? 30 .. may be.

India needs Cheerleaders - Mandira should go onto the field:)

Today's hot news...

Serious fight between Pakistani players and Indian players, for the window seats in the airoplane...

Sachin = legend!!
Ganguly = Tiger!!
Sewag = Lion!!
Dhoni = Killer!!
Srilankans = Good Cricket Players!!!

I don't understand how fans were expecting India to be in Super 8. Writings on the wall was very clear since the day Bangladesh beat India "India your day is over". So fans are so illusioned that they were expecting India would beat SriLanka and Barmuda will beat Bangladesh. Just hoping against hope. My advise to those fans, "be reallistic, Indians players are not god, they are human beings like you and me, don't expect them to do something beyond their ability".

Good luck to Bangladesh and SriLanka.

The fact that a politician is the head of our cricket board is a good indicator of where we are.....

rgds

Indian teams need a confidence. Iedian plyer are not bad but teams i cann't say ...........