India’s head coach has had his forgettable moments in cricket flannels and yes, he’s not won everything as the team’s off-field boss. But his achievements in both roles need to better recognised
Ravi Shastri at the Basin Reserve, Wellington, in February. Pic/Getty Images
I have often wondered why Ravi Shastri gets so brutally trolled on social media, especially for all those tweets surrounding his love for the good life, which includes his tipple.
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One, it’s no shame to enjoy a brew and secondly, the former India player, captain and current head coach of the Indian team has never disgraced himself in public. But then, that’s the plus and minus sides of social media — you can say what you want about someone without having to get his or her version.
You can’t help feeling sorry for Shastri (although he’d need no sympathy). In his playing days he was the cricketer who got booed even by his own Wankhede Stadium crowd. And now he gets roasted, ridiculed and rammed on Twitter. Sure, he had his forgettable moments in his cricket flannels and yes, he’s not won everything as head coach. But his achievements on both platforms have been underrated.
For starters, how many batsmen can claim to have become a regular opener for their country after starting out as a No. 10 in the batting order for his first series? Shastri can.
As a left-arm spinner, he claimed six wickets in his debut Test (v New Zealand at Wellington) as an 18-year-old, having arrived the night before the game armed with a Polly Umrigar-borrowed India sweater to deal with the chilly conditions in Kiwiland. Shastri had figured in as little as seven first-class matches before his first game for India.
Another example of Shastri’s grit was the way he responded to captain Sunil Gavaskar telling him to open the innings a few days before the sixth Test on the 1982-83 tour of Pakistan, after recovering from a split webbing. He did so by scoring a hundred against Imran Khan and Sarfraz Nawaz and as some of those players who were on that tour like to remind us, India were facing an attack which included umpires Shakoor Rana, Khizer Hayat and Javed Akhtar.
Shastri was not part of the victorious playing XI in the 1983 World Cup final against WI at Lord’s but he was a useful member of the squad and two years later achieved his pinnacle in one-day cricket by being adjudged Champion of Champions in the 1985 World Championship of Cricket.
Had it not been for an injury to Dilip Vengsarkar in 1988, he would have fallen in the category of the wiliest of cricketers not to have captained their country in Test cricket. Shastri got his opportunity for the final Test against the mighty WI in 1988. He marshalled his troops — which included three debutants — to a 255-run victory; India’s first against WI in nine seasons.
Shastri is one of the reasons for the 1986 Test against Australia at Chennai ending in a tie when he took a single off the third ball in the last over, after which India needed one run for victory. This got No. 11 Maninder Singh on strike, which did not impress the pundits simply because Shastri was the more accomplished batsman. But in Shastri’s mind, this was exactly what Australia did not want — to be denied of an opportunity to win the game. Or rather, India could not lose from here. As it happened, the game was tied and Shastri had no qualms in heading to the umpires’ room at Chepauk and giving V Vikramraju a blast for adjudging Maninder out leg before to Greg Matthews.
He was quite a stalwart in domestic cricket as well, having been part of three Ranji Trophy wins for Mumbai. The last one in 1993-94 was achieved with a young bunch that still swear by their skipper, who played through knee pain in his last season of first-class cricket.
In the 1984-85 final against Delhi, hosts Mumbai conceded a 65-run first innings lead and the advantage caused one of the Delhi key players to say something like, “polish that trophy, we are taking it home.” Shastri heard that, took responsibility with the ball and claimed 8-91 to beat Delhi by 90 runs.
Two series, which India lost, witnessed sterling performances from Shastri. On the 1990 tour of England, a touring Indian journalist wrote about India’s opening batsman needing to get a big hundred after his 100 (184 balls, 245 mins, 12x4, 1x6) in the opening Test at Lord’s which India lost thanks to Graham Gooch’s 333. The second Test at Manchester was drawn and in the final one at The Oval, which was also drawn, Shastri helped himself to 187. I’ve heard that he walked up to the writer and asked him if he was satisfied with his big hundred. No, he didn’t gloat but was glad to have ‘obliged’ him. Shastri’s two hundreds as an Indian opener in a Test series in England was a feat which only got accomplished by Rahul Dravid in 2011.
India were smashed 4-0 in the 1991-92 series Down Under but the bright spots were Sachin Tendulkar’s hundreds in Sydney and Perth. Shastri’s double century in Sydney too was a highlight for India. He gave debutant Shane Warne a caning, which the greatest leg-spinner of all time hasn’t forgotten. “Ravi Shastri smashed me all over the park; it was sort of embarrassing. I didn’t bowl long hops or full tosses, not many anyway. I bowled mainly pretty good balls, but got hammered everywhere,” wrote Warne in No Spin.
Eventually, Shastri fell to Warne for 206. The caught and bowled chance that he offered at 66 (according to Warne) proved costly as Warne returned figures of 1-150.
Shastri’s post-playing career has a thick successful ring around it too. He rose to be one of the leading Indian voices as a commentator across the globe, just like his first Test captain Gavaskar, and has lent more than a helping hand to Indian cricket in terms of advice and key appointments. Then, he became coach and though coaches don’t score runs, take wickets and catches, they contribute immensely to strategy. Yes, Shastri has made some eyeball-rolling comments about his team but that is, I suspect strategy too — the modus operandi of praising them in public so that they are motivated by it while he runs a tight ship behind the scenes.
Trolls may want to derive satisfaction by continuing to display their angst towards Shastri. But be kind to him at least today. It’s his 59th birthday.
mid-day’s group sports editor Clayton Murzello is a purist with an open stance. He tweets @ClaytonMurzello
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