Switch Hit

After a long time, saw a good classical test type innings last night from Shubhman Gill at Edgebaston. Innings where the solidity of defence formed the basis of run making. The first thought in facing every ball was to deny a wicket and still think of making a run. Coaxing the ball through the gaps without any undue risk. Either punching it hard to the fence or playing it softly away from the fielder and taking a single, every shot told the opposition that you can’t get me out, try whatever you want to do. Good old classical way of playing cricket.

In the era when the white ball short format cricket takes a centre stage, boundaries are specifically shortened to let unintended batting errors become sixes, bats have blades as thick as a tree trunk and edges give bowlers heart aches instead of wickets, such batting had become an exotic species on the verge of extinction! Cross batted biffs or what I fondly call as “bhathabaji”, where run making is more an accident than design, the numbers on the scorecard often leaves an old timer like me, a self – proclaimed connoisseur of cricket; dissatisfied and in some ways, cheated! Sure, run making is the name of the game. But when it accompanies a quality of batsmanship that pleases the eye, the enjoyment doubles. The short format game has cultivated the era where the run making has become the focus; how you get them, is not! It’s a bit like moving away from meaningful lyrics of a song fitting a melody to the adrenalin pumping rhythm taking the precedence in music making! You enjoy both, but a caress to the fence gives more pleasure to the cricketing soul than a cross batted biff over the fence. In terms of contest also, the former is more valuable as it breaks the bowlers’ confidence while the latter gives the bowler some hope!

Test cricket is a slow burn. A great first innings often doesn’t translate into a great last innings and a win! So, the key is not to just win a contest or small battles. Every battle won must translate into winning a war. And when your opponent is as good or better than you under the conditions, you need to dominate him mentally. Winning a few sessions isn’t enough. This is where showing complete command over your batsmanship gives your opponent despair. And equally importantly, your team a belief that you can win the war. When it comes from the leader, it acts as a tonic for the team.

Years back, in Indian cricket, Sunny Gavaskar’s batting used to give Indian team a hope that they can draw a test match, which was equal to a win in those days! Then a series of batters came along who took Indian batsmanship to new heights and instilled belief that we can win. There was solidity coupled with aesthetic beauty in run making. And occasionally that transcended into ethereal experience of watching a batter use his bat as a wizard’s wand and create magic. Watching Very Very Special Laxman gave me that feeling. Last night, Shubhman Gill reminded me of that bygone era of ethereal beauty, where he and batters like Mark Waugh used to not just rule the cricket field but also our hearts. Those beautiful memories had somehow got buried under the bazzballing avalanche. Thanks Shubhman, for reviving those great memories. May this continue through the series and beyond and make this ungainly contest between bliss and biff in test cricket, irrelevant!