India cap easy to get now

Subhash Rajta

Tribune News Service

Mohali, October 23

Has it become a little easier in recent times to make it to the Indian cricket team? Given that 32 different players have represented India in 22 ODIs since the 2015 World Cup — as many as nine have made their debut this year — one can’t help but agree. 

As Mahendra Singh Dhoni pointed out at the start of the ODI series in Dharamsala, quite a few of these debutants got the opportunity to play for India because of the Zimbabwe tour — during which India tried out fringe players — and when some regulars got injured and sat out.

Nevertheless, the fact remains that 32 different players have represented the country since April 2015. While it’s a great bit of news for the current and aspiring cricketers and they would hope for the trend to continue, the former players, who performed season after season but never got a chance to play for the country, slip into a wistful mood when approached for their views on the trend. They are of course happy for the current lot, but the pain they feel for not getting the opportunity themselves comes through loud and clear. “(Bishan) Bedi and I were talking about it a few days ago... It’s indeed getting easier to wear an India cap,” said Rajinder Goel, a former Haryana left-arm spinner who picked up a mindboggling 750 wickets in first class cricket but never got a chance to play for India. “Back in our days, we would perform, and go back home and sleep. No one bothered then; now you just have to pick one five-wicket haul and you are in the reckoning,” he added. “I picked up 750 wickets, had 59 five-wicket hauls and 18 10-wicket hauls, but still never got a chance. It definitely hurts but you can’t change your destiny.”

Echoing Goel’s sense of hurt, former Punjab left-arm spinner Bharti Vij, who was among the country’s top left-arm spinners from the late 1980s to the early 1990s, said they didn’t have the media back then to build them up. “The media these days builds up players as national prospects on the basis of a few performances. I was the country’s top-wicket-taker for two years running, had 24 five-wicket and eight 10-wicket hauls, but no one took notice,” lamented Vij.

The pain these cricketers have been carrying for decades becomes even more acute when they see someone “quite ordinary”, compared to the high standards they set for themselves, playing for the country. “Quite a few ordinary players have managed to play at the top level,” said another domestic cricket giant, wishing to remain unnamed. “Just see how many players who played for India in recent times aren’t even part of their district and state teams now!”

Even after allowing for a possible exaggeration and bias, this gentleman was not too far off the mark.