A Common Fan’s Sports Diary

The Taliban has a problem with almost every activity which regular people enjoy, most notably sporting ones.

They are on an endless banning spree, condemning a new sport every now and then for being unholy and un-Islamic. And they come up with a reason every time for why the sport was branded as such.

Sometimes it’s because there is too much skin show in the sport. That makes every sport where the athlete has to wear shorts or vests as a readymade target for being banned by the Taliban.

The jihadi outfit also mandates every man to sport a beard which makes it virtually impossible for anyone to practise a sport which calls for a streamlined body to reduce air or water resistance. Therefore there is no future for speed related sports like swimming and running.

Now the extremely popular sport of cricket has also been added to the Taliban hit-list. They feel it’s too long and hence people waste too much time over it. They feel that the ban on cricket will free up a lot of time and the populace will be more productive. The longer duration of cricket also interferes with the regular Namaz as people are too engrossed in the action to take a religious break.

Where does that leave sports in the Taliban does ruled areas of Afghanistan and the areas deemed ungovernable by Pakistan?

Is there any sport that the Taliban cannot find fault in?

Or rather, a sport which serves their purpose of glorifying Islamic Jihad and rubbing America’s nose into the ground?

Looks like we do have something.

Why don’t they try baseball?

The players are as covered as a human being can possibly be. It doesn’t take a long time to finish and can be played in the rocky terrains of the areas they rule.

But wait, isn’t it supposed to be the national pastime of the United States – a country the Taliban loathes and hates.

Well, that is exactly why the Taliban should be supporting baseball.

Because the United States suck big time at international baseball – losing regularly to the likes of South Korea and Japan as well as tiny nations like Venezuela, Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic and Cuba. The national pastime is becoming an international embarrassment for the sports loving Americans.

Tiny Puerto Rico celebrate after thumping the mighty Americans

Is there a better way to motivate the jihadi fighters by showing them videos of players from smaller nations out-duelling the big daddy that is the USA at their own game, quite literally? And at the same time everyone is covered from head to toe and the action finishes just in time for the holy prayers.

Isn’t it similar to the way, another set of underdogs (the jihadis) are supposed to beat the Americans at their other favourite pastime – playing global policeman.

I guess we have a winner.

It’s been two years since I started blogging and it’s time for a special post. No, I am not going to bore you to death by reminiscing, how blogging on ACommonFan has been a life changing experience or thank everyone – right from the person who invented the first blogging platform to the every family member or friend who I have discussed sports with.

Instead I will pay a little homage to The Sportstar – the sports magazine which made millions of sports fans in this country, including me.

What would I have been without you

I say sports fans because The Sportstar stood for more than just cricket. At a time when there was no cable and no internet and other than the Doordarshan’s telecast of the Olympics, the tennis grand slams and the football and hockey World Cups, there was absolutely no other way of knowing what else was going on in the international sports world, I looked forward to the weekly dose of The Sportstar like a drug-addict waiting for his next shot of cocaine. People who grew up in the nineties can never appreciate what this magazine meant in the 80’s. They covered a wide of sports in detail and brought to us some of the finest reporting and writing from the world of sports.

It was because of them that we came to know the players that we had glimpsed on television and understood the nuances of various sport and developed an appreciation for their history.

If not for them, we would have not known for the longest time about the NBA and about the various football leagues in Europe.

And they weren’t just covering different sports. They brought to us the finest works of the likes of Brian Glanville and Paul Fein – a breed of sportswriters that I didn’t even know existed – any die-hard football or tennis fan will tell you that these two are to the world of sports writing what Sachin Tendulkar is to the world of batting. Any article by these guys used to be read slowly and thoughtfully as if I was savouring the finest dessert in the world.

In a country where sports isn’t really part of popular culture or our daily lives, and reading is largely limited to the morning newspaper, it was testimony to their quality of content that they stood the test of time while many others fell by the wayside.

The internet made life really difficult for magazines like The Sportstar. Circulation fell and it was difficult to pack enough into a magazine to compete with the wealth of free content available on the World Wide Web.
They responded by reducing the cost of the magazine and coming out with a paid online format. However, the cost cuts haven’t led to any drop in the quality of the content. The works of Glanville and Fein still figure prominently and die-hards like me continue to do their bit for the circulation.

ACommonFan would have been reduced to just ACricketFan if not for the sustenance that the Sportstar provided for many years.

Thank you Sportstar for making me a sports fan and for making this blog a sports blog.

The two most explosive guns in the Indian batting arsenal

India’s batting line-up is currently the toast of the cricketing world. There has been no shortage of superlatives heaped on it, none bigger than Sachin Tendulkar calling it the best batting side that he’s been part of. That set off a chain reaction with various attempts being made to put the feats of this side in perspective.

Comparing this team with most of the older sides is a very difficult task – for the simple reason that the one-day game has drastically shifted in favour of the batsmen – thus enhancing the potency of a powerful batting line-up like this one. Comparing them with any of the older sides is like comparing the serve of a player with a wooden racquet on a clay court in the 70’s with that of a modern day player on a super fast indoor court with a graphite bazooka.

And that is why it will be unfair to compare the mighty batting sides of the 70’s and 80’s with this Indian side, or for that matter with any of the modern day sides whose effectiveness was amplified by smaller cricket grounds, easy paced wickets, better cricket bats and multiple restrictions on the fielders and the bowlers.

Not that I am trying to take anything away from the current Indian side. I am just saying that it is harsh to call them better than, say the West Indian side with Greenidge, Haynes, Richardson and Richards – because there is no way of knowing what they could have done today. Those guys gave us a glimpse of their ability in rattling up 360 against the Lankans in the 1987 World Cup.

Legends yes but never part of an all conquering batting side

The other thing which doesn’t make sense is to compare two sides by matching up the career batting records of the individual players in each side.

What really defines how good a batting line-up is at any point in time is the current form of the players and how well they perform the roles that they are allotted – a great batting side is one where each actor is playing his part exceptionally well.

Once you take that into account it is easy to see why Sachin Tendulkar is right – because although the line-up of Rahul Dravid, Mohd Azharuddin, Sachin Tendulkar and Sourav Ganguly is in a different league statistically, they never quite gelled like the way the current unit has – they never overwhelmed opposition sides with sheer batting might like the way the current team does.

In fact forget just Indian batting line-ups; few sides in the modern era (the period when 300 run scores became a regular feature) have had all the critical elements required to cook up the perfect batting storm.

The Australian and South African sides have dominated the one day game for long stretches but they have never done it on the back of an explosive all conquering batting unit. Their bowling and fielding units have made an equal and often more significant contribution in getting the victories.

The Indian bowling has also come up in leaps and bounds but few will argue that it is their batting which has made them such an imperious juggernaut.

But they are still not the best batting side in the modern one-day game.

Mad Max and the Matara Mauler - aptly named

That distinction still lies with the Sri Lankan side of the period around the 1996 World Cup.

That team opened with Sanath Jayasuriya and Romesh Kaluwitharana and they were followed by Asanka Gurusinghe, Aravinda De Silva, Arjuna Ranatunga, Roshan Mahanama and Hashan Tillekratne for most part.
Like the current Indian side, most of the players in that Lankan side reached a major crest in their batting lives almost at the same time, creating a batting machine which for a period of around 3 years mowed down everything that came in their way.

They also happened to be a flexible unit where each batter was performing a certain role which seemed tailor-made for their abilities. The Lankans have had great batsmen before and after but never have all the pieces fitted in so perfectly. They were so good in the one-day game that they had started harbouring hopes of becoming the best test side by 2000.

The height of their achievement was obviously the 1996 World Cup where they romped to the title without breaking sweat. Other than setting the then highest one-day score against the Kenyans, they also achieved the unique distinction of becoming the first side to successfully chase down a target in a World Cup final.

Like in the case of the current Indian side, critics will argue that this side did most of the damage on flat tracks against mediocre bowling sides. But every one day side in the last 15 odd years has had similar opportunities – very few one matches have been played on difficult wickets in this period and everyone gets to play everyone – yet no other side has demoralized opposition bowling attacks with such amazing regularity.

So what does the current Indian side need to do before they can stake a claim to being the best batting side of this generation?

They will have to do what the Lankan side did and more.

The Lankans stretched their hot batting form for more than 2 years and won the World Cup in the sub –continent.

The Indians can emulate their feat by riding this rich vein of form into the World Cup and then going all the way. Incidentally the next World Cup will also be held in the sub-continent and that will give the Indians a fair chance of matching the Lankans.

Till they manage to do that, the title of the best batting side in the post modern one-day game will continue to rest with Arjuna Ranatunga’s Sri Lankan side.