As a kid, I loved it when India won. Well who wouldn’t! And you don’t need to be a kid to like an Indian win, one would say! I am talking about cricket here, just to set the context correctly! Anyways during my childhood days cricket was the only thing you would hear India win. Occasionally hockey. So I would be pained to see India being defeated and at times by a huge margin. It didn’t matter who the opponents were, whether it was domestic or abroad, one day or test, day/night. Nothing mattered. What we wanted is an Indian win. To make us feel ‘proud’ and happy. In those times, when India didn’t matter, Cricket was the only thing that mattered in India. When India lost, every Tom, Dick and Harry made it their national duty to do a post mortem. Sometimes the demand was to change the captain. On other occasions it were the openers or the bowlers. Very rarely somebody talked about strategy. Because strategy didn’t matter if you lost.
As I grew older, we could distinguish between different tournaments, opponents and the relative importance of those matches. So we were naturally less emotive for a league game in world cup vs somebody like Zimbabwe. Or say, we would digest a defeat vs SA if it were not one of those knock out ones. Doesn’t mean that the love for the game was lost. Just that we began to understand that winning and losing were part of the ‘game’. As we grew further, other dimensions like the D/L system, match fixing, internal differences within the teams, occasional bad umpiring etc. came to the fore, making us realize that there were a lot of factors that go into winning a match. Not to mention the hard work the players put in, the strategies the team adopts etc. There was much more to the match than the eight hours we got to watch on television.
Eventually I realized that there are matches –always. World cup comes every four years. Bilateral series every 2-5 years. India wins some, loses some. There are reasons for the defeat every time. Some of them need to be (and are) acted on, some are not. Irrespective of the action, India still wins some. Loses others. The one thing I regret is that it was much later that I started liking the ‘game’. The sheer beauty of it wherein both the teams get a level playing field and get to execute all the practice, hard work, strategy that they have in their kitty. Variables being randomly distributed (sometimes in your favor, other times against), after all each team gets to play potentially 11 batsmen, 11 bowlers and 11 fielders. It’s the team that plays better on the given day-wins. Over a period of time, it’s the team that plans better, works as unit, prepares harder, starts showing results and shows remarked statistics. I also learnt that the success of today is not necessarily the outcome of the current team but years of preparation that went in with the earlier generations involved.
Even today, I feel happy when India wins. A little sad when we lose. The one thing that I have hated all along is to blame your defeat on somebody else outside the team. I hate it the most when people think ill of the team that defeated you. Support their opponents just because they defeated you. That’s not cricket. That’s sick. Today, more than India winning or losing, I love cricket! And that makes me happier –longer!
Just in case you are trivializing the analogy of cricket to real life, well there are differences and multiple other factors. But the ‘Game Theory’ works in all the cases. Always!
So when is the next match? Assam?
Happy Diwali!!!!!
As I grew older, we could distinguish between different tournaments, opponents and the relative importance of those matches. So we were naturally less emotive for a league game in world cup vs somebody like Zimbabwe. Or say, we would digest a defeat vs SA if it were not one of those knock out ones. Doesn’t mean that the love for the game was lost. Just that we began to understand that winning and losing were part of the ‘game’. As we grew further, other dimensions like the D/L system, match fixing, internal differences within the teams, occasional bad umpiring etc. came to the fore, making us realize that there were a lot of factors that go into winning a match. Not to mention the hard work the players put in, the strategies the team adopts etc. There was much more to the match than the eight hours we got to watch on television.
Eventually I realized that there are matches –always. World cup comes every four years. Bilateral series every 2-5 years. India wins some, loses some. There are reasons for the defeat every time. Some of them need to be (and are) acted on, some are not. Irrespective of the action, India still wins some. Loses others. The one thing I regret is that it was much later that I started liking the ‘game’. The sheer beauty of it wherein both the teams get a level playing field and get to execute all the practice, hard work, strategy that they have in their kitty. Variables being randomly distributed (sometimes in your favor, other times against), after all each team gets to play potentially 11 batsmen, 11 bowlers and 11 fielders. It’s the team that plays better on the given day-wins. Over a period of time, it’s the team that plans better, works as unit, prepares harder, starts showing results and shows remarked statistics. I also learnt that the success of today is not necessarily the outcome of the current team but years of preparation that went in with the earlier generations involved.
Even today, I feel happy when India wins. A little sad when we lose. The one thing that I have hated all along is to blame your defeat on somebody else outside the team. I hate it the most when people think ill of the team that defeated you. Support their opponents just because they defeated you. That’s not cricket. That’s sick. Today, more than India winning or losing, I love cricket! And that makes me happier –longer!
Just in case you are trivializing the analogy of cricket to real life, well there are differences and multiple other factors. But the ‘Game Theory’ works in all the cases. Always!
So when is the next match? Assam?
Happy Diwali!!!!!
