Team India’s WTC Debacle And BCCI’s Role

Both power house teams were chasing unique history to become the all round champions in the game. In the end, it came down to intent. Team India fell woefully short of their own expectations as another world cup title went abegging, asking the perennial question: where does the buck stop? Even the blame games have a short life.

It is easy to be more empathetic than scathing when a team loses a tournament running into the final day’s play and chasing down something as mammoth as 444 runs. However, the game seemed virtually gifted away in the manner in which Australia and Travis Head took the bull by the horns at the end of day one and the way India capitulated in their first innings and with poor shot selection in the second, the result was a near foregone conclusion unless team India did the Houdini and pulled a rabbit out of the hat.

In the same breath, it could well be argued that even the game stretching into the morning of the fifth day did little for something that should have been larger-than-life such as the ICC World Test championship.

This is not an isolated view though it seemed laced with not a bit of hypocrisy when stalwarts of the game, including former captains and coaches of the calibre of Sunil Gavaskar and Ravi Shastri, were already warning about players needing to get their priorities right. After all, these mega former cricketers rightfully earn their money, in equally colossal amounts, to be the town criers when the IPL comes around.

So, for their dramatic about-face lacks the hoarse voice of conviction that calls for resounding change when they know as much as anyone else that not even a World Cup level event is going to take more priority over the cash cow that is the IPL.

One could be forgiven for falling asleep as Rohit Sharma, the current Indian captain, droned on and on about the painstaking problems that besieged India in the course of the second ICC World Test championship final. This was India’s second stab at the crown and while New Zealand pipped them two years ago, this time it was their rivals, Australia, who gave India a lesson in humility on a flatbed of a pitch at the Oval where Test cricket seemed a run-of-the-mill affair while India played like they would – without enough conditioning time and preparations.

Australia could also have taken it lightly given that arguably the stakes would have been a lot higher in the traditional bilateral series, the Ashes, where the rigour of five Tests would test their mettle in English conditions. But they kept their heads down and got the job done, something the Indians could not say as Rohit Sharma’s press conference seemed longer than the match itself.

Where was the pride some might have asked? That would have been the case had the players seen the writing on the wall where large scale changes would have to be made to India’s international set up, given that some players are on the wrong side of the acceptable age and others are contemplative about their future vis-à-vis Test cricket.

Ironically it is not the grind of Test cricket or international cricket but rather the hectic nature of the IPL that leaves little room for preparation that no one wants to bell.

Expectations ran high quite contrary to India’s preparations or lack thereof ahead of such an important match. With less than two weeks since the conclusion of the Indian Premier League 2023, India had their work cut out for them, at the highest level after a two year cycle garnering precious points, one that tested their temperament, and more importantly, intent.

While every team player would say he did not go into the match thinking he was going to lose, one has to be practical given how the weeks panned out. After all, this was not a low key bilateral tour that usually follows the IPL where most of the frontline players are rested after playing in the only Twenty20 franchisee tournament they are allowed to participate in.

For the BCCI who made a hullabaloo about why team India needed a new captain and fresh mindset with a cup barren cupboard, they are as much culprits for what culminated at the Oval as the Indian cricketers themselves. And this is the problem of accountability because not one but several tournaments have gone, and this is not the first time that Rohit Sharma is eating humble pie in front of the media and fans.

The usual dribble of volleys will continue about how the current crop of Indian cricketers live cushy lives thanks to the lavish IPL and therefore, lack the hunger for national pride and World Cup glory. But when push comes to shove, Rohit Sharma has been vocal but equally hesitant to call timeout on his own team, the Mumbai Indians, when it comes to preparing adequately for an Indian assignment, now or in the past.

When the captain himself feels his hands tied from setting a precedent, either because of compulsions of the BCCI or keeping his long term future with the franchisee in mind given his age and India’s mismatched fortunes under his short captaincy, who else can be blamed in the team for not making bold decisions of their own volition?

While he was quick to put the issue of workload management on the various franchisees even before the IPL got underway, it was obvious to see that players see their paycheck and their longevity in the game as something that would accrue more from time in the IPL than in serving national duty.

If the Indian players fell short of their own expectations, they have also caused something of an upheaval in world sport, which is saying something since the subject of Test cricket dominance is currently in the hands of only a handful.

Such a diminutive representation cannot afford such sparse performances, where players of top order and in top form such as Cheteshwar Pujara, Shubman Gill, Virat Kohli and Sharma himself are found guilty of either shouldering to incoming deliveries that knock the bails off their off stumps or found fishing at the first wide ball they face. Either this is an effect of nerves or of recent muscle memory, unable to shrug off IPL instincts.

While the bowling has at times been testing on both teams, the peppering of the balls around the batsman’s chin have been barely a session or two. The fact that the game rose to the occasion in the sense that it went to the morning of the fifth day is in itself a testament to the relative batting friendly pitch.

The pitch rewarded those who chose to spend time at the crease, either digging in their heels as Steve Smith did or going for broke as Travis Head did, that changed the momentum of the game. It also, arguably, gave India a valuable insight into how to approach the match, a trick they obviously missed having put Australia to bat first.

While it is easy for affluent cricket boards like the BCCI to make tall claims that the modern day cricketers are quite adept at a quick change of format and that players can choose when they want to rest or ask for such, the truth of the matter is that they have been subject to nearly two months of relentless matches, travelling and hosting PR events. That takes a toll on their health and timing and discipline which are the hallmark quality of top order athletes, and it is not easy to switch, when the time of concentration is so vastly different as is the temperament.

No cricketer worth his while is going to tip his own hat and say he is ready to take a break from franchisee cricket even for a week ahead of even something as important as a World Cup. In an ideal world this is an onus that the cricket board should take upon itself, knowing that the opportunity might not be his the next time round financially and also, that the cricketer is being asked to make the ultimate sacrifice when really it is a facile compromise the BCCI could well facilitate in conjunction with the franchisees in the year of the World Cup.

But as too often evident and none more so than in the year of the pandemic, the IPL is critical for the BCCI’s survival and self-preservation policy to the point where a World Cup interests could well be compromised, leaving it to the individual cricketers to manage their own workloads and agreements with the franchisees who obviously have no other agenda than their own immediate interests given the money at stake.

There were not one but several shot selection queries raised and when this format does not matter to some of the more erstwhile contemporary cricketers who will anyway plausibly not be around for another cycle of the World Test championship or those youngsters who don’t see this as their bread and butter going forward, the stakes are not high enough for the sting to be felt against the skin.

Similarly with the BCCI earning more from simply licensing out their Twenty20 which they might well do with the Saudi Arabia sponsorship injection and with franchisees having proxy teams across the globe. This unless their face saving involves more than hiding behind the cricketers’ faults, unfortunately even in the context of a World Test championship, the International Cricket Council (ICC) will have to continue to pass around the begging bowl, not only to keep the oldest format alive but also, to ensure there are more competitors exposed enough to be hungry to compete at this level. It is now starting to look more and more like a distant dream and the lack of funding being only one of the reasons as the pandemic showed on the more embryonic Test teams.