From: cen466p@vaxc.cc.monash.edu.au (S. Parthasarhathy)
Newsgroups: rec.sport.cricket
Subject: Re: Captain & V.Captain (Indian Team)
Date: 9 Apr 92 22:58:54 GMT

In article <1992Apr8.165203.11391@news.iastate.edu>, kumaran@iastate.edu (K Kalyanasundaram) writes:
> In article <1992Apr8.160011.13554@infonode.ingr.com> tittu@tittu.b23b.ingr.com (Tittu Mathew) writes:

>>	3. Azhar was too adamant on many issues, for example he was so 
>>	   adamant in not to receive advice from senior players. This was 
>>	   very well pointed out by Ian Chappell in one of his articles 
>>	   in India Today. 
> 
> 	Ian Chappell makes his money by writing stuff people will be
> pleased to read.

So what mate. just see what one says rather than who says it, why he says it
and how he say it. i am not sure whether Azar did not heed any advice from the
senior players or not. but his captaincy is not very good. that is for sure.

> In the latest News India there is an article which
>>	   say he use to take most of his advice from Tendulkar and he use to
>>	   ignore seniors completely. 
> 
> Azhar need not approach you for advise. You can give it. He can be
> accused for not taking it. Whether if he had followed it, India would
> have won the test series, WSC, and WC is debatable.

	what u say is true. but when u try to give advice volantarilly to some
one and if u r ignored, what kinda incentive or motivation will u be having to
give advice again. i am not saying that is what has happened. it might
have which could have put people off. 

> Baig himself, in a interview given at
>>	   New Delhi said Azhar needs to learn a lot about captaincy. He said
>>	   the seniors should have adviced him on the field atleast.
> 
> Surprise! Now we know why we lost. Baig has as good a chance as any to
> be the manager for the SA tour.

ofcourse Baig is right. azar as a captin need to learn a lot. and unfortunately
his learning curve is very flat. i will strongly advocate for the appointment
of professional managers like bob simpson of OZ (Pataudi or Gavasakar's name
spring to mind). rather than using management of a team as a backdoor pension
scheme for ex-players.

>>	4. If there is a basic resentment among players about the captain, it
>>	   will be better to change him, otherwise it will affect team-spirit.
>>	   If such a resentment exists, each player will play for his own 
>>	   good than for the team.
> 
> Resentment will exist as long as just one person is the captain. Make
> the leading player from every zone the captain. Five captains that is.

I dunno y u are bringing in regional politics now. if people have talents and 
they work hard to give the best for the team and if it is not recognised,
naturally one tend to develop resentment.
 
>>	5. The worst thing to happen during the world cup was the day to day
>>	   interference of BCCI in running the show. A friend of mine has an
>>	   article from a leading Indian news paper which says, the board 
>>	   members used to call the Indian manager before every world cup
>>	   match and demand that he needs such and such player to be
>>	   played for this match. This sort of behaviour from the board
>>	   members were unfortunate. Even if you have the worlds best captain
>>	   and manager in the Indian side, it is not going to do any good if
>>	   the board interferes like this. Then, why is the team managment 
>>	   for ?.

Y u have not contrdicted this ? must I assume that u agree with this. if so,
again as Prabhakar and others complained, Azar does not have any say in the
team selection. IMO, in a tour, the selection committee consists of captain, VC
and the manager only because they know the local conditions. if that is
influenced by some "bunch of jokers" from Delhi, that shows the lack of
leadership and captaincy (Azar) and management (baig)

> Lets say if Imran and Brearley haven't won all those matches, would we be
> calling them good captains.

Nobody is complaining Azar for losing matches ( eg Adelaide and Perth) .
Winning and losing is part of the game. Going down without giving a fight is
the wrong thing. U need a die-hard, no surrender attitide, mate. that is what
Azar lacks. Even in losing u should keep ur head high. 

> There is a tendency to just look at the
> records! Azhar as I can see is the first Indian captain to have used
> four fast bowlers in a test match. 

This is what I call "looking at the records". We never needed four fast bowlers
before and we won more matches with our spinners than with our seamers.  Using
four fast (?) bowlers is not a credit man, how effectively the captain uses
them and what kinda results he can produce. Crowe for example opened the
bowling with Patel, an off spinner. that is not a credit by itself but how he
used him and how much damage he inflicted on other teams. that is the credit.

> He did look very positive defending
> the 125 in WSC and chasing fourth inning totals in test matches. Maybe
> we need captains who can win the first test at Bombay and draw all the
> rest five.

  or we need captain who (can) think positively only when the score is 125 ?

>>	7. In my personal opinion, not because of the losses, but because he
>>	   has developed that resentment and has lost that faith in his 
>>	   fellow players, it is time to give him a break. I think it will
>>	   be a good idea to bring Kapil back as the captain and make Azhar
>>	   his v.captain. Shastri because of so many obvious reasons, doesn't
>>	   think to be a good candidate for these positions. Let us say 
>>	   Kapil plays for another 3-4 years, by that time he can mould the
>>	   present young Indian team and by making Azhar his deputy
>>	   can learn a few tricks from that veteran. So by the time Kapil
>>	   retires Azhar will be much more ready than he is now. By 
>>	   bringing Kapil back we are not repeating the same mistake we did 
>>	   in 87. Instead, if they bring a new guy(for agrument sake let us 
>>	   say Manjerekar) as the captain then we are repeating the same 
>>	   mistake. In that case we will be better off retaining Azhar himself.

I agree

> Kapil has had enough chances, including the chance to set the field
> for Malik in the Calcutta one day game. Kapil's captaincy can be seen
> best by not watching the WC 83, but the Bangalore test match against
> Pakistan. 
 
If u think Azar has not had chances u r wrong. almost in all the matches in the
recently concluded series, Azar erred in his judgement. Even if he listened to
Channel 9 commentary, he could have learned more that what he gained all
through his stinct as captain (for info, all the commentators of 9 are
ex-captains. (Australia (Ian and Greg Chappel, Bill Lawry, Richie Benaud) 
England (Tony Greig) and India (Gavaskar) and lately Clive Rice (SA)) Forget
about what Kapil did in one match five years ago. Consider the overall
performance of the team and how they lost their matches. He is a die-hard
cricketer, learns by his mistakes faster (Chetan to javed incident in sharjah.
even today, he make sure that he bowls the last over (i have seen Kapil
reminding that to Azar couple of times). Good God, Prabhakar is coming out good
in bowling slog overs).

U may be a fan of Azar. I dont care. I am also a fan of Azar as a player. but i
think he lacks the leadership qualities. thats all. if he has leadership
qualities to the same level as his batting techinques, it would be wonderful.

but leaders are born and not made.

Paarthaa
ChemEngg