The Miserable Tale of Flamboyance in Cricket

Over years, cricket has evolved from a mere exhibition of raw talent to display of deftly constructed skills. Throughout this wonderful journey, flamboyance has always found its place in the cricket glossary and is the one used by the commentators and cricket experts more than often. Cricketers who exhibited this quality have enjoyed more media attention, crowd support and what not in comparison to the ones who possess a calm demeanor both on & off the field.

For instance, take the case of Shivnarine Chanderpaul, one of the finest batsman West Indies has ever produced. But, ever think of why it didn’t make a big news when selectors had shown him the exit door, forget about a farewell match or a felicitation ceremony. On the other side, players like Chris Gayle who have put their national duties in backseat and travel across the world playing fancy T20 tournaments have won millions of fans and garnered so fame so much so that even an ugly banter with a media journalist gets trended all over the world. The answer is simple – probably Chanderpaul should have spent few of his thousands of batting practice hours in molding his swagger, flamboyance and the rest would have followed him.

New parameter on the block

The recent struggle for the spot in the Indian Test Team between Chesteswar Pujara and Rohit Sharma presents another classic example. It’s beyond anyone’s ability to rationalize how a player who had tons of first class runs to his name and comparatively better record on the international test arena had to fight with a player who is believed to possess volcano of batting talent, albeit with below par performance in Test cricket.The one thing to consider in this context is that the players playing in shorter formats are constantly in the public radar and garner more attention by the crowd in comparison to the one whose batting is a throwback to eras gone by that comprises a mix of grittiness, discipline and self-control. It’s a bitter truth that the stardust of shorter formats has started to influence selectors and captains as well while making choices for test team combination. The state of affairs is not to blame anyone and that’s how modern cricket has progressed.

Till the last decade, before the T20 hoopla has engulfed the game of cricket, discussion in the cricket circles is mostly confined to parameters like footwork, technique etc., and now fast forward to 2016, captains are taking the case of strike rate for omitting a No.3 batsman in the final eleven. Players like Dravid, Kallis, Chanderpaul contributions were never measured with strike rate as their yardstick, rather on their ability to hold the team batting together and lay a platform for more flamboyant players like Tendulkar, AB Devilliers to express themselves.

In a nutshell, for a flair player to flourish, he needs support from rock solid players who cement the foundation while the gritty players’ success is to be attributed only to their hard work and determination and its high time we appreciate their real worth and not to keep a knife on their neck. Their game is simple - Lots of hard work, composed, determined and disciplined. Lets not add another dimension and try not to add them into the existing coup and save the game sanctity.