India

Ishant Sharma: Angry and suspended but still his skipper Kohli’s delight

Ishant Sharma is earning both plaudits and criticism.

If the bouquets are for his stirring performances with the ball, the brickbats are for the blatant aggression on the field that has not just seen him fined 65% of his match fee but also found him in violation the ICC’s Code of Conduct.

The new-found aggression and maturity (as a fast bowler) has not gone unnoticed.

Dilip “Colonel” Vengsarkar considers the lanky pacer his find.

He said:

“He has been bowling at good speeds, hitting the good length often and getting bounce because of his height and action.”

Amit Mishra had this to say about Ishant’s efforts with the ball in the first innings of the second Test.

“The way Ishant bowled with the new ball was important on a slow track. His effort in the heat, that spell set the game up for us.”

TA Sekhar, India fast bowling coach, said:

“Basically, he is bowling a good line and length. There is an increase in speed from what he used to bowl earlier. After starting (his career) by bowling 145 kmph, he reduced in pace. But now he has gained speed and touching 140. He is expect to give breakthroughs in the first spell with the new ball. Ishant has played a lot of Test matches but doesn’t have a great record. He lacks variation like what Zaheer Khan had and this is something that he has to start working on.”

Another former fast bowler, Chetan Sharma, believes that Ishant is a much improved player now.

He said:

“Ishant is bowling well. I was in Sri Lanka and I spoke to him for half-an-hour. He sounded a very mature fast bowler. There used to be shy bowlers who used to sneak past their seniors in order to avoid a talk with them, but not Ishant, who comes and speaks to you. And that tells you about his confidence. He understands what he is doing. And, he has the backing of a lot of talented youngsters like Varun Aaron, Umesh Yadav, Bhuvneshwar Kumar and (Mohammed) Shami. I don’t think there is a problem in the pace department. If a pacer can pick up 2-3 wickets on the sub-continent tracks, then I believe he has done his job.”

Fellow Delhiite, Ashish Nehra, was slightly back-handed with his compliments.

He said:

“I am a big fan of Umesh Yadav — talentwise even though he has not fulfilled his true potential as to what he should have achieved by now. He is somewhat similar to me but my case was more to do with injuries. Varun (Aaron) and Bhuvi (Bhuvneshwar Kumar) are also talented.
But Ishant Sharma, who has played 60 Test matches (62) is the least talented among them but one of the most hardworking guys around.
If Ishant has played so much and for so long, it is a testimony that talent alone can’t be the recipe for success. Talent can only take you till certain point but is nothing without hard work.”

If Nehra is right in that Ishant is the least talented among the current crop of pace men, then Indian cricket is blessed indeed.

Nehra spoke at length about Sharma.

Asked about his higher-than-normal strike rate, Nehra said:

“Look, there is a perception about Ishant. I agree his strike-rate is on the higher side but in last one year, he has taken five-fors in New Zealand and England. So he is improving. Don’t forget, he is only 27 and has already played 62 Tests because he started at 18. We should not put undue pressure on him and start saying ‘drop Ishant Sharma and get someone new’. What will happen if he is dropped? Nothing will happen. BCCI should just ensure that a fast bowler is given enough time and confidence to settle down. Dropping a bowler after one bad series can’t be a solution. A new fast bowler would take at least two series to just settle down.”

The Delhi bowler believes that fast bowlers do better when they enjoy the confidence of their skippers.

He added:

“Look the bottom line is, if you are bowling well, then you need nobody for help. But there will be times when even if you keep a deep point, the batsman will still hammer you. Then you have no option but to listen to your captain and bowl as per the field set by him. Michael Clarke was a great captain till last Ashes and today Alastair Cook has suddenly become a great captain. If you look at history of fast bowler-captain relationships — for example Sunil Gavaskar-Kapil Dev or Mohammed Azharuddin-Javagal Srinath, that has always been the case. When the going is good, nothing matters. Everything comes out when the performance level dips.”

Sharma seems to have no such problems on this score with his current leader, Virat Kohli.

Scribes might have expected some censure from India’s fire-brand captain given that Sharma will now miss the first home Test against South Africa for his aggressive send-offs in the third Test and the war of words with opposition players.

Kohli, however, was unperturbed.

He said:

“I was very happy with the incident (argument with Prasad) when he was batting. It happened at the right time for us because we had to bowl on Monday and they made him angry. It could not have happened at a better time for us And the way he (Ishant) bowled in the second innings, he didn’t concede a boundary for 19 overs. That’s the kind of pressure he created on those batsmen because of one incident. He bowled his heart out like he has always done when the Indian team has needed to defend scores in Test matches.An angry fast bowler is a captain’s delight. I was really happy to see what happened yesterday and it switched some things on in the right ways. It had to be controlled but in the end it benefitted us.”

The spring in the step is back and very much evident. After two hard-fought series in England and Australia where the Indians came off second-best, they appeared a much more hardy bunch in Sri Lanka. The score-line could very well have read 3-0 instead of 2-1 if the Indians had plugged away as they did in the last two Tests. It is a team sport and moments of personal brilliance and stellar performances can at most win you a Test or two. It takes consistent togetherness and toughness to pull through a gruelling series.

South Africa at home will be the real Test. Can Team India do an encore?

Flexibility is the key but players must be willing

Does position matter?

Coaches don’t seem to think so but players certainly do.

I know for certain—when playing my brand of gully cricket—I’d never open. Simply because I never felt comfortable facing the bowling right off, maybe because I wanted to have a dekko at the opposition first, or maybe simply there’d always be someone clamouring, “Hurry up and score some runs and get out; I want to bat too.”

That’s beside the point.

It’s psychological.

There’s a comfort factor associated with a player’s favoured position. That’s his lucky number.

Or that’s what he’s been accustomed to playing at or where for a long, long time. To move him around is a travesty of natural justice—to him.

Team Director, Ravi Shastri, the man who began at No.11 and batted his way up to No.1, does not believe that Indian batsmen can own a spot in the line-up. He feels that there’s a crying need for horses for courses. A player’s position will depend on the quality of the opposition.

He said:

“In this team, no one owns a batting position. It all depends on the situation. We will play horses for courses and see what the situation and the opposition demands. Accordingly, we will see what the best batting position in the side is for each batsman against that particular outfit and seeing the state of the series.”

Flexibility is the demanded norm. Ajinkya Rahane and Cheteshwar Pujara responded splendidly scoring centuries at No.3 and No.1 respectively.

The ploy worked.

The original strategy, though, of having Rohit Sharma come in at No.3 has fallen flat.

Sharma oozes talent but he needs the extra protection and a long rope for him to succeed. There’s little doubt about his calibre. He needs some time to come into his own. His lazy elegance is his undoing, much like David Gower, but both batters would defiantly deny any such claims vigorously.

(The  most technically adept player—after your openers, of course—should be No.3. In this side, it appears to fall upon either Pujara, Kohli or Rahane to fill this spot. Sharma is probably best at No. 4 or 5. In my opinion, you cannot have Rohit batting at that spot when the wicket’s a belter and then push him back when seamers make the ball talk and he fails. It’s just not fair to the others in the side.)

Former India hockey coach Arjun Halappa is on the players’ side when it comes to switching them around.

Paul Van Ass’ implementation of ‘Total Hockey’ is criticised as being too ‘harsh’.

“It’s very tough. When I started playing under (Jose) Brasa, I was a right winger and I was played as a central midfielder. I got really irritated at first, but gradually when I started to understand what the team wanted, I adjusted. But everyone can’t adjust.

I think it was too harsh on the part of Paul Van Ass to make those position changes straightaway in a big tournament (Hockey World League Semifinals). It could’ve been done gradually. Europeans have their own thinking, and they think they are always doing the right thing. But when they come to India, they have to understand the culture, language and players. You can’t just walk in and get things done the way you like.”

It differs from player to player. Every player needs to feel secure that he will not lose out when he’s moved to unfamiliar territory and where he may not immediately perform as expected. They deserve to be given some time to prepare and adjust. The challenge is mental. Visualization exercises with the team psychologist are not a bad idea.

Results will come when players are happy. Unhappy players are a dampener on performance and results. Process must take precedence.

Rahul Sawant’s on-field heart attack forces MCA to re-evaluate medical facilities

When a sportsman suffers a grievous, deadly injury on the field like Philip Hughes who was felled by a Sean Abbott bouncer or Raman Lamba who was struck on the skull by a powerful shot, we are always shocked and debate whether the sport can be made more safe for the players. All kinds of methods and inventions are discussed and remedies are provided. Hughes’ untimely death, unseemly as it was, has forced helmet manufacturers to provide newer versions of their products that now cover the back of the neck hopefully preventing a recurrence of such an event.

Raman Lamba (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Pain in acute myocardial infarction (front) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

But when more and more players are felled by disease on the field (and myocardial infarction is simply a symptom of coronary heart and artery diseases), it is time to look at the reason behind its occurrence and question the immediate reaction that exercise itself is unsafe for individuals.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

An outsized reaction to medical tragedies on the field is unwarranted and unbecoming of informed, educated persons.

Rahul Sawant, a 34-year-old wicketkeeper-batsman with Dahisar Cricket Club suffered a heart attack on Sunday while playing in the Dr HD Kanga League.

He was rushed to Bombay hospital by his teammates which saved his life.

Speaking to DNA, his skipper Pravin Gogri said:

“He was also feeling suffocated and could not bare the pain. We gave him water, but it didn’t help. We could not find the doctors provided by the Mumbai Cricket Association. Then we rushed him to Bombay Hospital.The Kanga League (rule) book says there are doctors at various grounds, but we could not find one at Azad Maidan. God knows what would have happened had we reached (the hospital) late.”

Gogri’s teammate added:

“He doesn’t smoke or drink. He is a nice man and a good cricketer. Life is full of stress these days. Today’s youngsters lead an unhealthy life. They sleep late and have loads of stress. We have now started going back to playing Kanga League on wet wickets. This could cause injuries. The MCA should be prepared if something like this happens.

Sawant has spent Rs 40,000 already. Let’s hope he is out of danger. He is the only son of his parents. You never know what can happen. I am sure MCA can afford ambulances for emergency situations.”

The matter will be taken up by the MCA in the next managing committee meeting with a promise to provide the desired medical facilities for all players.

MCA Joint Secretary, Unmesh Khanvilkar, said:

“This is a rare case. Normally, injuries like cuts, bruises or sprains happen while playing cricket. Hence we have appointed physios and provided first aids at various points of the grounds. But this is something which is serious and we will have to look into it.

We have to come out with a solution to make facilities that could deal with something like this. Other than the physios who are already there, we will try to arrange doctors who can deal with these issues. Also, we will try to arrange ambulances at each centre including gymkhanas so they can be used during emergencies.”

Sawant, meanwhile, will undergo angioplasty to remove a couple of blockages in his heart.

CPR training (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The move by the MCA is welcome. Sportsmen definitely need doctors around to tend to them should they suddenly succumb to ailments on the field. Immediate medical attention, especially in the case of heart attacks and treatment such as cardio-pulmonary resuscitation (CPR) can make the difference between life and death.

But that is not the end of it.

Players , too , need to monitor themselves and their bodies and not overexert themselves after a tiring week at work or play.

More on that later….

Golf: Anirban Lahiri—the great Indian hope

Anirban Lahiri is the next great Indian hope. The sport is golf.

The 28-year-old finished joint fifth at the the PGA championship—the final Slam of the year.

It is the best ever placing by an Indian golfer at a Slam surpassing Jeev Milkha Singh’s tied ninth place at the 2008 PGA event.

This is just the beginning for the young man who won the Long Drive competition on the Tuesday before.

Lahiri is in line for being the first Indian golfer to be an endorser for Rolex watches.

Lahiri’s manager, Neeraj Sareen, said:

“We are almost on the verge of signing a contract with Rolex. They got interested in Lahiri once he entered the top-50 in the world and earned a ticket to all the four Majors. He recently signed a multi-year deal with leading Italian luxury clothing brand Chervo. He has been wearing Chervo clothes since the British Open and has got good results there and in the PGA Championship too. My phone has been ringing continuously in the past couple of weeks and there have been many brands who have shown interest in him including Banyan Tree Hotels, with whom we are likely to sign a contract in the coming week or so.”

Over the past 18 months, Lahiri’s rise has been nothing short of meteoric beginning at 195 and currently at 38.

Lahiri is also the first Indian to play at all four majors in a calendar year only missing the cut at the US Open.

Can Lahiri be the one who makes history for Indian sport by inscribing his name on one or more of the golf majors?

We will wait and hope.

Post-mortem: Team India needs to sustain momentum

Team India lost the first Test to Sri Lanka at Galle from a seemingly invulnerable position.

A batting collapse followed an inept display of bowling intent which let the Islanders back into the match.

Once a foothold was established, the home side drove home their advantage in the face of tentativeness from the visitors.

Does this signal the end of the ‘five-bowlers’ theory?

Virat Kohli says no and he is right.

He said:

“If I have said I am going to play with five bowlers, I cannot go down after a performance like this and say I wish I had an extra player, you cannot play with 12 players. If I have chosen to play with five bowlers to take 20 wickets then it is our responsibility to bat in a better way which we did not do today. So I am not bringing up any excuses or wishing that we had an extra batsman. We should have done this better with six batsmen.”

The Indian skipper has a point. The team is going to lose some when they try to win games.

The mind-set and execution should be to play positive cricket and go out there expecting to have a result.

Playing for a draw never brings about a gain for the side unless your opposite number is suicidal.

virat kohli (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Kohli should continue with his game-plan and should expect more from both his batsmen and his bowlers.

The bowlers have to bowl on average 18 overs in a day given the current dispensation; that’s only eight more than what they would in a one-day game and that’s in just three-and-a-half hours.

They cannot complain.

The batters are to shoulder the extra responsibility and not count on the tail to wag. It is their job; they are specialists.

What Team India also needs to figure out is how to tackle counter-attacking batsmen. Man-of-the-match Dinesh Chandimal revealed that he and his partners batted as though it were an ODI. Well, if that’s the case, why doesn’t the Indian skipper set an ODI field? Drying up the runs would have certainly lessened the damage especially when your bowlers seem to have run out of ideas.

It’s about adapting to the situation.

And the Indian media and former cricketers-turned-commentators should refrain from playing the blame game whenever India loses.

Sometimes, you have to admit that the other side played well and deserved to win for their ‘never-say-die’ attitude.

Sanju Samson is allegedly the Abominable Salivator

Sanju Samson has allegedly behaved badly.

The India ‘A’ keeper has been accused of salivating spitefully at his Australian opponents’ feet.

The incident occurred in the tri-series final between the home side and the visitors.

India ‘A’ clinched the title, registering their first victory in the series against their counterparts from Down Under.

The Kerala player claimed a catch that the Australians felt was illegal.

This led to an exchange of words when the 20-year-old came out to bat.

Usman Khawaja, the Aussie skipper, said:

“Obviously the guys in our team were disappointed that he claimed he had taken the catch.

Today he spit in front of our player’s foot three times. If you do that the boys are going to get worked up and the umpires were not understanding it. We did try to calm the boys, but they just went on and on.

I am happy if the batsman happens to talk back but spitting is not on. He spit on one of our players when he came onto the field.

If one of our players said something to him, he can say something back but not spitting.”

Khawaja added:

“I do not want to make a big deal about things that happened on the field. I do not want to take away any credit from India. They really played well today and were the better team to have won.

Unfortunately, incidents like that happen. Some incident happened the other day with one of your bowler (Sandeep Sharma). He was coming back and it was fine. I was happy with that. I have seen it all, it is another game, it does not affect me too much.

It is always tough to defend a total of 220 runs. We had our chance when the fifth wicket fell but we have to take wickets to win the game. India just batted sensibly. The wicket was up and down and it was not turning massive. If we had few more runs we could strangle them on that kind of wicket.”

The match umpires and other officials should be filing their report with the BCCI.

An investigation into this kind of unwarranted behaviour and its antecedents should be launched to prevent any such recurrence.

Players behaving badly—spittle-less or not—can only lead to more bad blood in the future and should be nipped in the bud.

It is a gentleman’s game after all.

Back to shooting school with 70% attendance compulsory

It’s back to school for our national shooters.

Headmaster Raninder Singh,  NRAI president, has cracked the whip.

Air rifle, pistol and shotgun shooters have to minimally attend 70% of the training camps.

Else they will not be allowed to represent the country at international events.

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The immediate trigger for this rule change are the “baseless” sexual harassment charges against national coach Stanislav Lapidus by Anjali Bhagwat, Suma Shirur, Sanjeev Rajput, Ayonika Paul, Lajja Gauswami, Tejaswani Sawant and Kuheli Ganguly.
Embed from Getty Images
Singh said:

“When you don’t attend the national camps, how can you accuse him (Lapidus) of not attending to you? Most of the time our top shooters remain absent from the camp.”

The rule affects ‘hobbyist‘ Abhinav Bindra and army shooters Jitu Rai and Vijay Kumar most.

The policy , however, is quite progressive—for an Indian body.

Young and single mothers can miss camp during emergencies.

20 elite shooters had skipped the recently conducted senior national camp in Thiruvananthapuram.
Embed from Getty Images
At the same camp, 14 army shooters had received orders to report back to their units for selection to the World Military Games in South Korea from October 2-11.

The trials were scheduled for July 2. The national camp concluded on July 6.

An NRAI representative said:

“The Army told us about their selection trials at the last minute. NRAI was always clear in its scheduling that the shooters will have to report for the camp after the World Cup trials. Army never informed us in advance about their trials, otherwise we would have worked out a solution. NRAI has requested them to postpone their trials by a week so that their shooters can report to them after July 6.”

The Army later rescinded its orders.

The shooting camp was also hit by a food poisoning episode with at least 12 participants hospitalized.

Gagan Narang, Jitu Rai, Apurvi Chandela and Abhinav Bindra are the only shooters to have secured quota places for the Rio Olympics based on their international performances.

A maximum of 30 quota places (two each) in 15 disciplines are available to every country.

Lalit Modi wishes to take over the cricketing world

Lalit Modi is a megalomaniac.

The former czar of the IPL wishes to take over the world—the cricketing world.

And that too in style.

Modi and his cronies have envisaged a new world order that does not require the sanction of the ICC, one that affiliates itself with the Olympic movement. The blueprint will do away with ODI cricket altogether and consist of only Test and T20 tourneys.

Modi said:

“We’re talking about another cricketing system. There is a blueprint out there, it’s got my rubber stamp on it. I have been involved in it. I say it for the first time, I’ve been involved in putting that (blue)print together. We could take on the existing establishment, no problem. It requires a few billion dollars, I don’t think it would be a problem to get that … into action.

The plan that I have put together is a very detailed plan, it’s not a plan that’s come off the cuff, it’s been taking years and years and years in the making.”

International Cricket Council (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The fugitive from justice has termed the big three of international cricket, India, Australia and England “snakes”.

Speaking to ABC Network in its documentary, ‘The Great Cricket Coup’, Modi said:

“They are the three snakes of cricket. You’ve got to take their neck off, you’ve got to chop their head off, otherwise cricket will not survive.”

(Modi apparently does not understand that snakes have no necks.)

Modi added:

“For me to get players would be…a switch of a button. There was a report that ran on the front of The Australian newspaper that said $100 million pay cheque for two of your players. I think that’s an easy cheque to write and if that cheque is easy to write then ‘would I get the players or not?’ is a question you should ask the players, not me.”

The heartening aspect of this extraordinary plan is that Modi does not intend to do away with Test cricket.

Also, he does see the need to gain approval from another body, if not the ICC, the IOC.

That is going to be an onerous task.

The ICC is unlikely to relinquish control over a sport that is a money-spinner for the powers-that-be without a fight.

It would be interesting to see how Modi’s plot pans out.

Kerry Packer and his ‘pyjama cricket’ improved cricket telecasting and was the harbinger of fatter pay packets for the players and commentators.

Not that the sport needs more; at least, the Indian players would differ strongly.

But an offshoot of any such attempt might mean that more cricket is played all over the world and the profits redistributed to many more nations much like Sepp Blatter’s FIFA, perhaps, without the endemic corruption and powerplay(s).

More power to Modi.

‘The Great Cricket Coup‘ is available for viewing here.

Sexual harassment charges hits the shooting fraternity

The Athletes Commission it is.

The National Rifle Association of India’s probe into allegations of sexual harassment of junior shooters by its Kazakh coach Stanislav Lapidus drew a blank.

The complainants were six senior women shooters including Olympians Anjali Bhagwat and Suma Shirur.

The probe concluded that the sextet were lying.

The other members of the group are Ayonika Paul, Kuheli Gangulee, Tejaswani Sawant ,Lajja Gauswami and Olympian Sanjeev Rajput.

A DNA India report states that the above “accused the Kazakh of making ‘sexual overtures’ and forcing junior shooters into having ‘physical relations’ with him. They alleged that Lapidus promised the juniors ‘personal coaching’. Why, they also said he was rude, arrogant and doing everything in his power to ‘finish off’ the careers of the country’s top marksmen.”

It is believed that the senior shooters had a grievance that the coach was being too strict with them and did not care for seniority.

Five ways to fight sexual harassment(public service poster on a Seoul Subway Line 2 train) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

NRAI chief Raninder Singh said:

“When we asked Bhagwat and other shooters to substantiate their claims, they had nothing to share with us. They could not provide us the details of any incident where they felt that such sexual overtures have been made. In fact, Bhagwat herself told me that she wrote the mail in a fit of anger. The reaction of the other shooters was also the same. They said Bhagwat told them to become co-signatories and they put their names in.

In the letter, it has been mentioned that Lapidus asked one of the junior girls her age. When she said she was 17, the coach told her ‘to come back when you are 21’. That’s all. Now, where is the sexual overture in this sentence? What the coach meant was that he couldn’t impart coaching to her as he only trains shooters above the age of 21. He doesn’t look after the junior coaching programme anymore. He only deals with seniors.”

The DNA India report claims that Lapidus was traumatized by the accusations and offered to quit.

The allegations were emailed to the NRAI by Bhagwat’s husband Mandar.

Singh added that the NRAI is unable to take any action against the errant shooters since they are not contracted to the association.

The complaint will be further probed by an Athletes Commission headed by Arjuna Awardee Moraad Ali Khan.

Interestingly, Anjali Bhagwat in June was part of a probe investigating sexual harassment charges by a junior against two of her male colleagues.

Bhagwat and Shirur will be asked to recuse themselves from the committee.

According to Wikipedia,

“Sexual harassment is bullying or coercion of a sexual nature, or the unwelcome or inappropriate promise of rewards in exchange for sexual favors.  In most modern legal contexts, sexual harassment is illegal. As defined by the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), ‘It is unlawful to harass a person (an applicant or employee) because of that person’s sex.’ Harassment can include ‘sexual harassment’ or unwelcome sexual advances, requests for sexual favors, and other verbal or physical harassment of a sexual nature. The legal definition of sexual harassment varies by jurisdiction. ….

Where laws surrounding sexual harassment exist, they generally do not prohibit simple teasing, offhand comments, or minor isolated incidents. In the workplace, harassment may be considered illegal when it is so frequent or severe that it creates a hostile or offensive work environment or when it results in an adverse employment decision (such as the victim being fired or demoted, or when the victim decides to quit the job). The legal and social understanding of sexual harassment, however, varies by culture.

In the context of US employment, the harasser can be the victim’s supervisor, a supervisor in another area, a co-worker, or someone who is not an employee of the employer, such as a client or customer, and harassers or victims can be of any sex or gender.

It includes a range of actions from mild transgressions to sexual abuse or sexual assault. Sexual harassment is a form of illegal employment discrimination in many countries, and is a form of abuse (sexual and psychological) and bullying. For many businesses and other organizations, preventing sexual harassment, and defending employees from sexual harassment charges, have become key goals of legal decision-making.”

Is Sairaj Bahutule’s move to Bengal ‘unethical’?

“To put it bluntly, Bahutule has been unethical in his approach,” was the response from Dilip Vengsarkar to former Mumbai legspinner Sairaj Bahutule’s decision to throw up his position with the U-23 squad and take up the offer from Saurav Ganguly to coach the Bengal Ranji side.

Vengsarkar is currently an MCA vice-president.

The Colonel added:

“That he would do something like this behind our back is unimaginable. If he wanted to coach a Ranji team, why did he leave Vidarbha and then Kerala, or was he asked to leave? If he is getting a job to coach a Ranji side, then would he leave the same team halfway through if he is offered to coach say Bangladesh or Zimbabwe? The whole episode has shown him in extremely poor light.”

Sourav playing. Cropped picture of original (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The former India chief selector may be right to show his displeasure at the sudden turn of events. And can rightly voice his disappointment.

However, to term Bahutule’s move ‘unethical‘ is to stretch a point.

Bahutule has every right to decide whether to stay or leave based on his assessment of the opportunities afforded him in his current position or elsewhere.

Similarly, an employer is well within his right to terminate an employee for a variety of reasons ranging from non-performance, indiscipline to closure of business. Wrongful dismissal can always be challenged but that’s another story for the courts.

Can an employee then not term his employer ‘unethical’?

For Vengsarkar to cavil at Bahutule’s abrupt departure is to ignore the dynamics of an employer-employee relationship.

The right to work is secured under Article 41 of the Indian constitution just after the Right to Privacy.

This should in no way hinder Bahutule’s right to work mobility as well.

The question Vengsarkar and his colleagues within the MCA should be asking themselves is how can they attract and retain the home-grown talent that is currently farming themselves out to various states not just as coaches but also as players.

Vengsarkar admits:

“The fact is that former Mumbai cricketers are offered huge amounts of money by other associations, not only because of their coaching skills but also because of the way they played the game. They try and inculcate the same values and pride they had when they played for Mumbai. The Mumbai cricketing system makes the players mentally tougher, smarter cricketers. Besides, Mumbai has a great history which no state team in the world can match for the next many decades. As a result, a Mumbai player or coach is always at an advantage while bargaining better deals for himself.”

I have always been a huge fan of Mumbai’s Ranji team. That the side now struggles to even make the knockout rounds tells a tale of declining fortunes in recent times.

Perhaps, it’s time the MCA took steps to shed some of its ‘khadoos’ image specifically when it comes to reclaiming their own.