Breed a Test Players' Pool

By Vikram Afzulpurkar

The knives are out. Every Indian fan is shunning the team. Well, cut them some slack! We won the World Cup.

The question to be asked is whether or not, in the last three decades, we sought to play our cricket so the game's biggest financial power ever known, a country of 1 billion who'd divorce their spouses to watch the best game of cricket, win the elusive World Cup title. Now, that's 50-over cricket. We styled our cricket on young bloodhounds, hungry for attack. Our TRDW (Talent Research Development Wing) of the BCCI scouted for such players. And got them.

Picture this, one of the talent scouts back in 2003 spotted a young player in the Eastern part of the country and described him to chairmen of selectors Dilip Vengsarkar as a "hard hitting match winner." Vengsarkar gave his approval and the long haired boy from Jharkhand was blooded in as a wicket-keeper batsman.

The stocky 'boy' first justified his selection fully when under him India won the 2007 T20World Cup. Well, this is just one of the stories of aggressive players bred for India. Now, suddenly an England tour, notably against a top opposition, castles them.

Cheteshwar Pujara presents a pure Test player option

Hey, how about a change of player-breeding pattern for particular formats? After all, we have such a vast pool. Well, the expression 'horses for courses' is now cliched though very true and was first famously muttered by an England manager. It meant playing players on particular turfs, like for instance, a spinner on a turning track, or for that matter adding an extra batsman when it was felt necessary. We need to apply this for various formats of the game perhaps.

While, all teams field supposedly separate sides for Tests, ODIs and T20s, the five or six who play two or all formats for India are enormously taxed in schedule. Money spinning India just can't afford to have a rest period for its audiences. Just imagine the mental strain a Dhoni or a Tendulkar goes through.

A revolutionary idea, though it is, maybe we can rest several players, by rotation, on different Test tours. Against England in England and with this English team, we should have had our best guys on. Whereas poor old Zak is injured, Nehra just not ready, Harbhajan back at the NCA in Bengaluru or in Punjab listening to old folk songs. Did we as an audience fail them? We keep asking for them to be seen on our TV sets. So do the advertisement and marketing companies.

Maybe a complete segregation of India cricket teams of various formats is needed not just for the rest for key players but also to breed another lot that only plays Test cricket and allows them time to develop.

With a 0-4 drubbing, do we have the resolve to allow for more time and more failures? Maybe it's worth thinking about. I know that the moment I write this, the comments are going to come thick and fast against this theory, along with opinions of so and so player "should have been picked" considering "so and so". :)

Agreed, everybody may have their valid points, but my question is "Are we missing the larger picture." Can we have a grand plan that helps generations of our cricketers succeed? Maybe it takes too much pain to see Dhoni, Tendulkar, Raina rested in a single series? No pain, no gain?