manedge

 When the sporting world was looking to return as close to the normal as possible in mid-2020, England, West Indies and Pakistan resorted to playing Test cricket in England. The Indian cricket authorities were going back to the drawing board again and again to re-schedule the T20 tamasha that is central to their scheme of things. After two months of T20 cricket they landed in Australia for first limited-overs and then Test cricket. But when your top players face each other in T20 cricket alone, how can you expect the Test team to do well? As if the Indian Premier League (IPL) was not enough, the 2020-21 domestic season has only one contest - the Syed Mushtaq Ali T20 tournament. There is no word on Ranji Trophy. So when England arrive in India for a four-Test series in February 2021, India's Test specialists would have only played T20 cricket at home because auction of more players for new teams in IPL 2021 is the Board for Control of Cricket in India (BCCI)'s sole goal.  ...

There is universal respect and even admiration for those who are humble and simple by nature, and who have absolute confidence in all human beings irrespective of their social status...It is such good men and women who are the hope of the world.   These are words of Nelson Mandela in 'Conversations with Myself'.  The moot point is - does being humble and simple work in the real-world?  When we look around us, our leaders, be it in the corporate or political or even the social world are all self-advertising braggers. If they don't go over the top, we refuse to see them. That is largely because of the huge congestion in the social media space. Every one is out on some digital platform telling the world what they had for brunch or what they have created. Visibility is so easily available.  But are these leaders being humble and simple? Let us for once assume they are simple, but definitely not humble. Or is it the new normal? In the corporate world, leaders who are aut...

“One of us drops anchor/ While the other gets off to a flyer./ It’s not because one is more impetuous/ Or cautious than the other./ The assault, like the defence, is calculated./ We play the same percentages/ to different rhythms, following/ our own sequence/ of stressed and unstressed beats,/ each of us fashioning/ our own departure from the norm.After the crescendo, the rest,/ after the rest, the crescendo./ One of us foil for the other, as it should be./ Personality will out./ We perform in our styles/ Because that is our function./ We never get in each other’s way./ We perform who we are/ Because that is what the situation demands –/ But at a pinch we can swap roles,/ One coming out of the shadow of the other.” Ref: Street Music, collection of poems

When Yajuvendra Singh took seven catches in the Bangalore Test against the English in 1976-77, my friend Sajeev showed me still black and white pictures of the match and that drew me to cricket, which I have been romancing since then. After losing the first three Tests to 'magical' bowling by John Lever, India had fought back and won the fourth at Bangalore. By then the vaseline headband used by Lever to keep the bowl shining had been exposed by Indian captain Bishan Singh Bedi. The first series that I really followed, first day by day, and virtually ball by ball was India's tour Down Under in 1977-78. The Indian team began the tour by playing four-day as well as one-day matches against state teams over a period of four weeks before the First Test at Brisbane. The Kerry Packer World Series had, by then robbed top teams like England, West Indies, and Australia of its superstars. Australia fielded a near rookie team, except for Jeff Thomson and out of retirement 42-year-ol...

Everyone today, barring a few who might have seen wars or famines or riots in their lives, or even suffered on account of having been affected by these catastrophic experiences, is seeing a lot of things for the first time in their lives. Most of us have not been affected by the Emergency or the anti-Sikh or Gujarat riots directly or for that matter the economic crisis of 2008-09. The 1971 Bangladesh War to a six-year-old was a time when lights would be switched off in the evening with police loudspeakers ensuring total blackout. And in less than a month, our lives have changed. We are no longer doing what we would be on a normal working day or even on a Sunday. We are, at the same time, doing what we have never done for many years - clean the car and the house, pick up a book, watched movies on TV or series on Netflix or Amazon Prime, and so much more. Our conversations with friends and family are more intense and lengthy. Forwarding WhatsApp messages is a new service we have taken...