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| Greg has no place to hide | | |
By R Mohan |
Greg Chappell’s India honeymoon was over long ago. It got over on the day his email about the wiles and guiles of Sourav Ganguly was leaked to the press. Now, it’s brickbats far more than bouquets but they come with the territory. The Australian from a peaceful leafy suburb of Adelaide should have known life is different in the jungle that is modern international cricket.
By his own admission, he now tries to keep his "head below the parapets" while he has locked out the media from his briefings who still managed to get his quotes on air about how obsessed the Indian cricketers are with their mobile phones and their personal music gizmos.
Scorn is raining now, especially after the Champions Trophy in which Team India were either batting poorly or bowling badly, mercifully not on the same day though such alternating failures did nothing towards trying to win two of three league matches to stay in the competition.
In a nation that is compulsively analytical and generally critical of its favourite sporting team’s performance, an imported coach becomes a most convenient target. And if that coach has been seen to be tinkering with the team to an excessive degree without producing the desired results, he quickly becomes the primary scapegoat. Chappell’s ‘experiments’ may even have helped deflect criticism from the team itself of which skipper Rahul Dravid was rather forgiving, attributing failure as he did in the key Australia clash to inexperienced bowling. When Indian quick bowlers are told to be aggressive, all they learn is to pitch woefully short, their military medium becoming cannon fodder as it travels down the pitch to batsmen inured to playing the ball around their waists.
On testing pitches, not only India but the whole of Asia collapsed unable as they were to stand the scrutiny of having to dig in and fight for every run at the batting crease. Chappell must always have known what the Indian experience was going to be like. The rock star status, so easily conferred in the era of obsession with celebrity, also comes laced with the hemlock of hate that flows so easily from emotional Indian cricket fans who are slaves to the moment.
Having already divided them into pro and anti Ganguly droves, Chappell was inviting the upbraiding that comes so quickly in these parts. The dispassionate will know that the coach is not the one padding up or wheeling his arm over in the heat of contest. But, granted supremo status by selectors who are not immune to the charms of foreigners presenting their point of view with lucidity, Chappell was certainly putting his head on the chopping block. John Wright was a hard act to follow.
Whatever be his demerits, he did stand behind Ganguly as India typically rollercoastered between home brilliance and offshore feebleness and still rose to such heights as to reach the World Cup final in South Africa. This is something that will be held against Chappell and Dravid since they appear to be stumbling in their build-up to the World Cup.
Former captains like Bishen Bedi and Kapil Dev who have tried their hand at coaching the national team and failed tend to rub it in when the team hits the bumps. Not that Chappell-Dravid have not left room for such criticism, their unvarying use of Pathan at a pivotal number three lending itself nicely to critics with the acerbic tongue as well as their demotion of Sehwag to the middle order where he feels lost. Many of Chappell’s moves had an authentic ring to them.
His fault may have lain in his not being adept at changing tack when he knew plans or personnel were not working. What may not have permeated his stubborn Aussie temperament is patience has a very short fuse in these parts, so short that not even the tall ramparts of India’s ancient forts may be sufficient for him to hide from the brickbats.
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