Why Vengsarkar has to resign - interview with a critic.

[gator]

These are the excerpts of an interview with a fan and a critic(myself) who places most of the blame squarely on the head of Chairman of selectors, Vengsarkar. So why do you blame Vengsarkar for this pathetic showing? Gator: A batting lineup of 7 batsmen oof which 4 are Kaif, Raina, Jaffer and Mongia. Do the math. But he feels there is no talent in India, hence these guys. Gator: He is spouting bull-shit and he has not been made the chairman to throw his hands up.... he can resign if there is no talent... So what do u suggest should have happened Gator: powar instead of mongia... ganguly/laxman instead of jaffer... gambhir instead of kaif venugopal instead of raina ganguly and laxman have experience of playing good pace attacks and yuvi's absence makes us short of experience and one of the two who have scored centuries against class pace attacks should have been brougt back, cos their fielding is equal to jaffer's.... Powar has not been given the credit he deserves in our good run last year... he can get the key wickets in the middle overs and throttle the run rate.... he could have contributed as much as mongia in the last 5-10 overs with the bat.... Gambhir is hot in form now... scoring 50s and 100s consistently.... cant play the hook well..... talent was always there as he showed in a hundred only in his 2nd or 3rd odi.... but now he has brought in consistency too by going back to domestic cricket..... YV Rao - A guy who has scored 228 unbeaten and chased down a 4th innings target of 500 against a pace attack of 90+mph bowlers like sajid mahmood and Simon Jones is sitting at home while an 18 yr old kid who has only 2 domestic hundreds is hopping like a rabbit in SA... Thank you for the interview and best of luck watching the rest of the bloodbaths Gator: Thank you. I will be following Archery from next season as I heard we are winning more in tht...

[jf1gp_1]

Re: Why Vengsarkar has to resign - interview with a critic. Agree with everything except Vengsarkars resignation. Give him time.

[Lurker]

Re: Why Vengsarkar has to resign - interview with a critic. Gator. By most accounts Malcolm Marshall is considered to be the greatest bowler in the past 20 odd years, and according to many the greatest ever. Certainly one of the best of all times/era etc. Do you know which was one wicket that Marshall craved more than most? A certain Colonel Vengsarkar. I must be frank that it was not entirely due to the fact that Vengy was considered the best batsman of his times, but more along the lines of Marshall maintaining that Vengsakar appealed for the catch in Marshall's debut innings knowingly very well that he(Maco) wasnt out. The umpire gave Maco out and he came back crying to the pavillion. Ever since then Vengsarkar was his Enemy no 1 and the wicket in his entire career that gave him the most satisfaction was when he dismissed Colonel at 96 in a Test in Windies and didnt let him score the century. If you check Vengsarkar's record you would find that he did pretty well against Windies, specially in a couple of Test series, with Maco at his pomp. To meet the best bowler of your time and cover yourself with glory takes some doing. This is the same Vengsarkar that had come into reckoning after he had smashed sixes off Bedi and Prasanna in Irani trophy finals(was it Duleep trophy?). And this was the same Vengy that led Bombay to almost victory against Haryana in a hopeless situation and lost by 2 runs in arguably the greatest Ranji ever. Moral of the story - Vengy knows a thing about talent. He is not a Dalmiya or a Powar. He has been a good player if not great in his own time and his cricket judgement, and commitment, is second to none. Truth be told I do not see any emerging talent around us. You know you are in trouble when Raina is the best emerging talent in the country. I am not sure, and I hope you wouldnt take it the wrong way, if you meant the above post in a sarcaustic manner or you were just stating the obvious but in my opinion the fault is not with the management but with the team in itself. Take a look at the following: 1) Indians claim they have been done by pace and bounce. And guess what Shaun Pollock has 6 wickets for 45 in 2 matches thus far! Shaun Pollock! Great a bowler as he is, he has hardly touched 130. So where does pace come into equation? Throw Kallis in and you have 11 wickets taken for 75 runs. Bounce yes, but pace? Two words...my ass! The fastest South African bowler Ntini, while a handful, is not a patch on Alan Donald and that should put things into perspective. 2) When India lost 2nd ODI it was widely suggested that Sehwag was missed. When was the last time Sehwag fired? In the CT his position was being questioned all the time. But he doesnt play one game and people think he is gonna change India's fortune. So what does he do? He come up and gets dismissed for zero. Talk of carrying faith! 3) Pretty much any team is in trouble in ODI when their best batsman is Rahul Dravid! I greatly respect Dravid but you simply cannot have a good team with Dravid as best batsman in ODI. You need a Ponting, a Hussey, a KP, a SRT of yore, Inzzy and so on. Dravid's role is that of Younis Khan for Pakistan, Collingwood for England, Martyn for Australia. Stem the rot when wickets fall in and a good 50-60 is what is expected of them. I beleive it is alarming that Dravid is India's best batsman in ODI today. xxx

[gator]

Re: Why Vengsarkar has to resign - interview with a critic. nice post, Lurker. it is true about the MAcko hatred for colonel for wrong appeal and it is also true tht Vengsarkar was a very good fighter..... but tht doesnt mean, he can identify talent... if all decent international cricketers can have an eye for talent, then you wouldnt hear much about how Imran khan discovered inzi, akram, younis... having an eye for talent is different from having talent....

[The Outsider]

Re: Why Vengsarkar has to resign - interview with a critic. What surprises me is that we have one of the best identifiers of talent the world has seen in Greg Chappell(he was instrumental as selector for the Aussie turnaround of the mid 80s) and continue to pick junk. There can be two reasons: 1. He doesn't have much say in selection. 2. This is the best talent around. I am inclined to believe the former.

[King]

Re: Why Vengsarkar has to resign - interview with a critic. Lurker a good thoughtful post but I firmly believe in what Gator said, Vengsarkar has blundered as for selection goes. Isn't it the same man that said VVS is not fit enough for ODIs and is now throwing him in the fray? Honestly Vengsarkar comes across as someone that hardly has a clue what talent exists in the country. He's in there because it was his Zone's turn to throw up a selection committee chairman. Just because Vengsarkar says there is no talent and he batted well in his hey days we should believe is that? That is utter rubbish by Vengsarkar. A statement such as that is simply not on. All the talent that was on display till recently has vanished is it? I have read his statements prior becoming the selection Chairman and his views were a lot different then. My 2 cents on this one.

[yoda]

Re: Why Vengsarkar has to resign - interview with a critic. rao is not a ODI player. he needs to be tried in tests. powar is so fat, he is only fit to be a sumo wrestler. i agree, jaffer was a disastrous selection. gambhir has failed in the past. yes, he should be given another try. i would go for vvs instead of kaif. ganguly needs to be playing tests and not ODIs. that's where he was atleast half as effective before being dumped.

[Lurker]

Re: Why Vengsarkar has to resign - interview with a critic. Ravi/Gator, I would agree that just being a former player doesnt entitle Vengsarkar of being a judge of talent. But that should suggest in the least that he has played at the highest level and knows a thing or two about pressure and that too against formidable team. Coming to his comments about no talent in India, I remember him clarifying later on that what he meant was "there are no talents in Indian domestic circuit that one can simply pick and put directly in International cricket". I would personally agree to this. I for one havent seen a talent like say Sachin or even Azhar who is exactly setting domestic circuit ablaze. Piyush Chawla is one and he is rightfully not being played immediately. There is also the fact that Vengsarkar has his own ELF Academy thing going in Bombay where he trains kids between 11-18 if I am not mistaken. So clearly he is in a position to make a statement about the talent. Sure we dont have to take it as a holy grail but then again based on domestic tournaments I am not exactly floored by any talent. Coming to VVS. In my opinion his selection is by elimination and not on his performance. Today he gets picked because all others have failed. It is not that he has been selected as an automatic choice in XI. In his last 10 ODI he has scored 1 50 and has averaged under 30. His average in South Africa is also bad(10) though he has played only 2 games to be fair to him. Not to mention his fielding. So yeah I can certainly agree that VVS didnt deserve to be picked in starting XI. Then again we have played so bad that a case for VVS can surely be made now. xxx

[gator]

Re: Why Vengsarkar has to resign - interview with a critic.

rao is not a ODI player. he needs to be tried in tests. powar is so fat, he is only fit to be a sumo wrestler. i agree, jaffer was a disastrous selection. gambhir has failed in the past. yes, he should be given another try. i would go for vvs instead of kaif. ganguly needs to be playing tests and not ODIs. that's where he was atleast half as effective before being dumped.

Rao is a much better stroke player than ur kaifs, YKs and tharangas.... he can easily stroke a run-a-ball 80 at number 3... he needs an extended run at number 3....

[gator]

Re: Why Vengsarkar has to resign - interview with a critic. Lurker, Vengy himself was a very mediocre ODI player... Tell me a product of his elf academy.... nowadays everyone opens coaching and talent spotting clinics...

[gator]

Re: Why Vengsarkar has to resign - interview with a critic. Irfan pathan needs to be sent home after these ODIS and made to play the entire ranji season...

[The Outsider]

Re: Why Vengsarkar has to resign - interview with a critic.

I for one havent seen a talent like say Sachin or even Azhar who is exactly setting domestic circuit ablaze.

I would say Venugopal Rao and Badrinath look to me to be 45+ averaging batsmen at the international level from what I've seen specially Rao has a very neat back foot game, a rarity for Indian batsmen and required to succeed abroad. For ODIs, someone like Manhas should be tried out. He looked impressive in Challenger and has a List A average of 50!!

[The Outsider]

Re: Why Vengsarkar has to resign - interview with a critic.

Vengy himself was a very mediocre ODI player

What are you talking about? He was possibly our best ODI batsman till Siddhu came along in '87. Srikanth was too inconsistent, Gavaskar never really was good till his last 4-5 years, Amarnath again too slow generally, Patil didn't last all that long.

[gator]

Re: Why Vengsarkar has to resign - interview with a critic. Shwetabh, lotsa people sadly have bought into Vengy's no-talent theory which he expressed cos he had no clue how to do his job, which was to scout for talent and not look for inflated scorecards.... Ganguly was nothing special in domestic when he was picked and went on to become one of the greatest in ODIs.... Dravid was non-flashy and good, but so was Sharath and his contemporaries... u got to look for the steel, spark, skill and not jus the 50+ average...

[Bumper]

Re: Why Vengsarkar has to resign - interview with a critic. Lurker, thanks for that gem on Maco-Vengy. Very nice to read about little known incidents like that about yesteryear players. My thoughts on Vengsarkar: 1) He was waxing lyrical on how he would value performance as the single biggest criteria for selection & then promptly picks Jaffer over Gambhir. 2) The man says Laxman is not for ODIs & within 2 weeks, sends Laxman as the replacement for Dravid. 3) He says there is no talent in the domestic circuit. My question is, exactly how many earth shattering talented blokes have we unearthed over the last 30 years (u can count them with your fingers) ? Have we not picked new players all these years to replace our failing/ageing cricketers ? Except for a handful of players in the lineup, Indian cricketers, always had to be groomed. Hardly any are ready for international games, right away. Even the ones that seem ready, dont last the distance.

[King]

Re: Why Vengsarkar has to resign - interview with a critic. The excellent examples of limited skills but lion hearted individuals are Robin Singh (truly a fighter and a fantastic fielder), Jadeja (some may say he had talent but I think he was a great fighter again), Sidhu (aggressive and worked at his game), Anil Kumble (clearly the best of non talented ones) and many more come to mind. When picking a player you have to see his track record and performances particularly in the important games such as Duleep Trophy, Deodhar trophy, Challenger trophy et al. Whether our selectors dig into the performances of the players to be picked and base their selections on such samples is anyone?s guess. I don't reckon our selectors know their job at all. They speak less about selections and want to handle every other aspect of the game. Firstly they need to be told to go watch domestic cricket around the country, then get them to do some home work on some of the better players and then finally given up on zonal trade offs. It's all wishful thinking I suppose and will never really happen.

[The Outsider]

Re: Why Vengsarkar has to resign - interview with a critic. Gator, Ravi: Agree with you guys on the need to bring in guys with steel and pluck. My sample size of judging Rao and Badrinath is limited and probably the same as everyone's else on the board. But from the little I have seen of them and whatever I've read from here and there, they sound like cricketers who can make it to the top. Obviously, the wise men seem to have other views. Ravi: Good list of the hard working ones who flourished though I feel Jadeja was really talented. His drives were so ferocious and silken that they did not appear to be from someone who came up just largely on hard work. Was also a natural in the field like Azhar.

[gator]

Re: Why Vengsarkar has to resign - interview with a critic. heck, y go so far as jadeja and robin singh.... kumble is the best example of steel, determination and discipline..... our selectors want to sit in one place and think a sachin or kapil will fall in their lap.... then anyone can be a selector....

[Bumper]

Re: Why Vengsarkar has to resign - interview with a critic. In the last 5 years, I cant think beyond Sehwag, to some extent, Yuvraj and Dhoni, who transitioned to the big stage with ease. And there are many examples of cricketers who we thought were READY, only to be reminded that they were a mere flash in the pan. Parthiv Patel, Irfan Pathan, Mohd Kaif, Reetinder Singh Sodhi to name a few. So instead of looking for the next Tendulkar, who doesnt exist, lets try grooming our next Vengsarkar or VVS out of a Badrinath or Rao.

[gator]

Re: Why Vengsarkar has to resign - interview with a critic. right bumps... even trying to spot an exquisite talent, these guys are doing a shyte job.... take this for instance.... against a 90mph attack of sajid mahmood and simon jones, a 4th innings target of 500 with very less time, instead of usual spineless batting, a young tyro, Rao blasts 228 and takes the side to victory..... if tht aint superb talent, i dont know what is.... he averages 24 in around 10-15 odis.... sehwag averages around the same too in his last few matches... why the hell is he not being groomed... he has proved he can play run-a-ball innings, he has proved he can play long innings too, in tests.... the selectors are total tripe...