Do we have talented players?

[Cricket46]

I have been reading closely, various posts regarding the performance of our team, as a whole or as individual players. I have also read the posts on computing batting averages with keen interest. No matter how you spin it – whether you use all data, or exclude the outliers or even do hypothesis test of players scores, maybe for “not out” scores we could use techniques in censored data analysis. Just kidding. The bottom line is the same - there really isn’t much difference in the performance of our batsmen. One formula may rank one player higher than the other, but I don’t see much qualitative difference. These are really statistical issues for which there isn’t much need here.

All of us agree in unison that our batting has been pathetic lately. The thing that is lacking most is consistency. One 50 here and another 10 matches later is not going to take us too far. We have tried experienced, debutants, young and old, tall and short, nothing changes the scenario much. The question we need to ask is: how do we improve? Then there are other associated questions that will come up. First of which is, do we really have talent? I may disappoint a lot of people, but I don’t think we have enough talent to bear fruit at the top international level. There is so much hype about the under-19s and younger age groups. Something happens between that period and the time when they come into the senior team. I don’t know if it is because they are pushed in too early or simply because the transition is not smooth enough. Meaning, maybe the opposition is suddenly too strong for the youngsters. Probably, our expectations are brutal and unjustified as well. Those who are at the helm should be trying to find out what really goes wrong in the interim period.

These days the kids get so much more facilities and training. So there cannot be much complaint on that ground. If we assume that we really do not have great talent base how would we improve our domestic cricket? Average players playing against other average players will create winners who are nothing more than the average. Again, if this assumption is true we are never going to perform against quality opposition, let alone teams like South Africa. At this level we cannot say SA is too strong. Then we should not be playing in this elite league. Don’t get me wrong, several years back we argued about the 2-tier ICC discussions. I am not in favor of that. But we also need to be realistic, which team would like to host us in our present state. These are not weekend afternoon games. Cricket is a big enterprise and if it does not make sense financially, we will be out of the picture one-way or the other. ICC has their calendar and because of that teams have to play against us. But we need to get our act together and make those matches less of heartache for us - fans - and farce to the rest of the world.

One thing that I always felt was that we were not being invited often by our three Asian test-playing nations. The physical proximity should have been exploited. We need to play much more of first class and limited over matches with their zonal/regional/state teams. We should send most of our national team players – not just ‘A team’ players - but not call it the national team. Our players never had that intermediate step. I am ignoring our local leagues. They were suddenly pushed into the deep end. The other suggestion that I have is to bring current quality international test/ODI players and make them play in our domestic cricket. But I guess that will become more and more difficult with the advent of IPL and ICL. Those players are more expensive than diamonds.

" target="_blank"> But say I am wrong and we actually do have talented players, why then are we not performing? I don’t mean a handful of good players. How good is talent if it is non-performing. It is like saying that kid is very talented but he does not study hard and does not do as well in his exams. We need a pipeline through which young players will graduate to be full time national team players and make their mark in International cricket.


Man for man we do not match up to any of the other 8 test teams. I doubt if we can beat the rejuvenated Zimbabwe team now. But we are always thinking of a miracle. But miracle is a miracle, they happen rarely. Just like our victories. Having said all these, even 4 hours before the 3^rd ODI I am hoping that we will do well.