Amitayu Sharma
Unfortunately due to the quirks of the game, this treating of hockey ball as one would a soccer ball led to penalty corners which despite the “best flayer of arms” goal keeper that India ever produced led to goals. When the players were required to dribble, they drooled. When the need of the minute was to pass the ball to their counterpart, they mistook the ball to be their own dear life, something to be held onto as long as one can. When the Indian players did get a chance to strike, they struck hard, have no doubts about it, unfortunately, the only place the shots didn’t go was the intended target.
Then, the ball collection was not clean. While cherry picking when they did manage to park themselves alongside a meandering, rolling ball they mistook it with a hot potato, or rather a slithering poisonous snake, and furiously and judiciously passed it on to their hapless opponents, who blind passed it to the Indian goalie, a knight in shining armour and a clear vision, and a clearer concept of never to be counted amongst those who would disappoint a guest’s demand. So, a Goal it was.
Team play was as co-ordinated and tight as a bunch of rose petals twirling in the dusty storms of Gwalior.
There is something wrong in all this. The way we go about bemoaning hockey’s death in India. There is something, in fact, everything is conceptually wrong about how we view and develop hockey in India.
Cricket did not become popular because of team work. It is slower and less lively than hockey (except for TwentyTwenty), yet it managed to upstage Hockey in India. Why?
Corporate did not open their coffers overnight. Millions of brilliant people along with not-so brilliant mortals like me did not elevate a Sachin to the pedestal of God just like that. Office goers, all over india, did not suddenly start taking casual leaves to watch a Cricket match, students did not suddenly woke up one day to find that cricket is hep and happening, and started bunking their classes and exams to be glued in front of TV. Sales people all over India did not suddenly, out- of- the- blue got market friendly whenever a cricket match was being played, that they spent extended time visiting dealers customers and the like.
Expats like me reported to our office, all bleary eyed after spending a long nights following ball-by-ball commentary on internet, refreshing the screen, not because we were all insomniacs.
The shining greats of underworld were not turning toward saint hood when they temporarily suspended their nefarious activities to earn extra bucks betting on how a certain Harbhajan would react to a seemingly simple question of how he is feeling before or after a game, or what would he do after taking a wicket?
The whole temple was built painstakingly over the years by cricket players, who were paid less, had to toil harder, spent more time on the field, travel distances and put their whole future in line.
Everybody loves a champ. We all get a vicarious feeling of winning and fulfillment when our team beats arrogant adversaries. That’s what Indian cricket players have been doing over the years. When not beating other teams they managed somehow to break records.
Nobody would say that Indian cricketers are the copy book examples of team work, nor would anybody in their wildest moments put their wager on claiming that Indian cricketers are consistent. These traits simply do not exist in our genes.
We look for, talk about and promote team spirit, but just think about it, this is all trash. It is individual performers we love. It is individual achievers we worship. It is hard to worship an entire team along with support staff that may include a mumbling honourable Mr. Pawar grovelling in a crumbling Balasahib’s empire or a wily Modi framing the rules of the game.
It’s easy on our stressed minds to love and worship an individual performer.
So, get on with it. Look for individual brilliant performers. Look for an accurate Get Sethi, an intelligent Vishwanathan Anand, shrewd Ambani, original A.R. Rehman, sweet Lata Mangeskar, a chamingly repetitive Shah Rukh, an angry Amartabh…Amitabh Bacchan, a tenacious Gavasker, inspired Kapil, a chest thumping Dada, even a overflowing Great Khali, a Rahul in reboot/refresh mode (no not that one, I mean the Gandhi one), a marauding Sehwag, a God Sachin, or a magician major Dhyanchand.
It is individual performers that have captured our imagination, go selectors’ look for that brilliant hockey player whose hockey stick would have to be checked again and broken to find if it carried hidden glue that struck to the ball. Do it now!!! Open your eyes.
For those who doubt that out of 1.15 billion Indians it can’t be done, just think of new crop of singers coming out of musical TV shows.
Just one Guy- who would latch on to the ball, as if, it was life and death matter
One kid- who would selflessly love the game, not its trappings.
One youngster, with stars in his eyes, who would trail blaze across the field and illuminate our lives and ignite our dreams and passions. We await a hockey player; we deserve such a hockey player.
While we mortals wait to adulate and shower our affection and blessings to such a player, the corporate of an increasingly richer and shining India are standing by with their coffers. It’s your call selectors.
