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Originally Posted by Beamer
BTW, what did you think about GC 's recent comment about India?
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Greg's another rather awkward personality, and I knew his comments would cause great indignation in India, especially given the bad feelings that many Indians have regarding his time as coach there. Many comments posted on the cricinfo site suggest that this was a ploy to sell more copies of his new book, but I'm not so sure about that.
I think he was probably speaking the truth, as he sees it, and there lies the key. It all has to do with different cultural standards. Indians and Australians are very different people. Compared with us they have more difficulty challenging established ideas than we do. That is not to say we do not respect our elders here, but if they talk utter rubbish we are allowed to say so. We have a far more robust culture with regard to the exchange of ideas and I think that's what Chappell was getting at when he spoke about leadership.
Of course when these articles are published everybody gets upset and I wonder if they really end up reading the article carefully and understanding the context properly. The media has a great part in inflaming passions and in this regard the Indian media are atrocious, always sensationalising issues and often wilfully misquoting people. In that respect they are as bad as the very worst English tabloid newspapers.
In the original article Chappell was fullsome in his praise of Dhoni as a leader. I wonder if many readers read enough of the article to see that, or if they were already posting angry comments in response to a sensational headline.
Personally I feel that on the subcontinent and the rest of Asia the fear of loss of face is a real barrier to the free exchange of ideas. Here you're expected to be able to take a bit of constructive criticism. Take Sachin Tendulkar, for example. The Indians call him a 'God' and any implied criticism of him is a mortal sin. In Australia Ricky Ponting is merely the first among equals and is not above criticism or scrutiny-he is one of us, not someone high above who lives in some special sphere.
Chappell does,however, have the habit of not understanding how his comments will be interpreted by others, and the comment about "the British having taught them well not to stick their heads up over the trench in case they got shot" was unwise, especially given the Indian antipathy towards him. What he was of course saying was that the British had oppressed them and made it difficult for them to be open and honest with their opinions, and that perhaps this was still a factor today. If that comment was against anybody it was against the British. In his own awkward way it was an expression of sympathy for the Indians.
All things taken into account he probably should have kept his mouth shut. He should have known how his comments would be interpreted badly and that no good would come of it, no matter how well they might have been intended. He's taken such hysterical criticism in the past from the Indian media that perhaps he doesn't care any more. I don't really know for sure but that's how I think it is.