Indian cricket fans around the world can be forgiven for feeling like they’ve woken up in the nightmares of the past.
Such has been the horrible nature of their Test series against England, that many fans cannot contemplate how nearly the same 11 cricketers pulled off a World Cup victory to inspire more than a billion people mere months ago.
During the 20-month reign at the top of the Test tree, the Indian media was quick to point out how Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s team had overcome its travel travails of yesteryear to be a force to be reckoned with whenever and wherever. Indeed, that was the premise that made the current series with England so appetising in the lead-up.
However, what viewers have been greeted with has been closer to satire than spectacle.
To emphasise India’s awful performances in the Test series would be doing an enormous disservice to the disciple and the long-term planning England have shown. Indeed, the fortunes of both teams should be noticed very carefully by our own group of Australian cricketers.
If India’s large legion of followers are wondering what has happened to their team, then Australian fans are guilty of the same charge. Discontent has been consistently growing over the Australian cricket team’s loss of identity that has come at the same time as its slide down the Test table.
It is a worthy accusation to label a portion of Australian fans as bandwagon gloryhunters, as they’ve deserted any interest in our national team’s fortune since losses have started piling up more regularly than wins.
However, for the overwhelming majority, Australian cricket stands at a crossroads between the upholding of tradition and the embracing of a capitalist future.
I, of course, refer to Cricket Australia’s newest plaything in the Big Bash League. If the original Big Bash format wasn’t simplistic and frivolous enough, then CA’s decision to dismantle Australian cricket’s great Shield teams for a 10-team city based format out of thin air is deliberate attempt to imitate the Indian Premier League.
I bring up the IPL for the very reason that many Indian fans are now citing their team’s current plight to how their undoubtedly talented group of cricketers have been swayed by the momentary riches brought by Twenty20 cricket at the expense of the skills they once practised hour after hour in the streets of Bombay and Delhi. After all, Sachin Tendulkar didn’t become a great batsman by first knowing how to hit across the line.
This same prospect now greets Australia’s cricketers, and thereby threatens the wellbeing of the country’s great Test team. While it may be simplistic to merely cite India’s poor performance as a cautionary tale for us, the other lesson is to look at what England have done during the last decade.
Remember the days that when people thought of English cricket, they thought of Phil Tufnell? Ian Chappell’s classic quip of “the other advantage England have got when Tufnell’s bowling is that he isn’t fielding” comes to mind (apologies Phil if you’re reading).
Jokes aside, a plan was put in place that was aimed at reviving English cricket to the summit of the Test format. With the arrival of Rod Marsh and the ideas he had successfully implemented in the leadup to Australia’s great era, the results weren’t immediately forthcoming.
Laughable performances in one-day cricket continued (and still do to a certain degree), while England’s Test team kept getting soundly beaten one Ashes contest after another. Their fortunes against other foes heralded mixed reviews.
Still, they persisted, in the face of vicious media slandering from many sources, including certain defunct Murdochian newspapers. Michael Vaughan found a group of capable cricketers and took them to dizzying heights in 2005, before Andrew Flintoff plummeted nearly the same troupe to embarrassment little more than 12 months later.
Then came the Pietersen/Moores ego contest, a brief flirtation with a Texan billionaire, and continued varied performances on the field.
Yet they persisted.
Andrew Strauss was dropped, and recalled to captain the side. Moores was replaced by the Zimbabwean great Andy Flower, and the response was to be bowled by the West Indies for a paltry 51 in their first display.
Thirty months later, they stand as undisputed kings of Test cricket.
What do we choose – the Indian route where hordes of cash have thwarted every other ambition once proudly held aloft by the traditions of Australian cricket, or the England option where a slow tedious process is taken to restore our team to its once former glory?
The choice is yours, Cricket Australia.
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