Garry Sobers v Imran Khan,Test Cricket:Poll

[bagapath]

A dictatorship is only bad if you think that democracy is the best solution. There is a bit of literature that suggests, with good reason, that autocracy is the most efficient system for progress.

I don't know what literature you are talking about. But coming from a democratic system I obviously think otherwise. I don't even believe in god, so I certainly can't imagine being ruled by an autocratic leader. I would like to choose my leader and want to be able to criticize him when he makes a mistake.

The problem with an autocratic captain of a cricket team with unlimited powers is that there is no scope for out of the box sporting moments. Botham's heroics of 1981 headingly would not have happened under imran's leadership. Brearely asking botham to keep whacking the ball was an inspirational moment of a skipper recognizing his player in the zone and letting him be.

Imran kind of leaders decide what is right for everyone. They deliver sentimental speeches, win a few games, draw a lot more and when they retire the team goes back to indiscipline.

Autocratic leadership doesn't work if smart players are dictated by a captain who doesn't let them blossom. As a system such dictatorial captaincy creates insecurity and is divisive in the long run as it happened to pak cricket afer imran's retirement. Salman85 claiming pak team needs such dictatorship is sad to hear. As a team pak should develop a culture of equality and camaraderie like the present day indian team or recent australian teams that are ruling the world at the moment.

 

[Fusion]

I don't know what literature you are talking about. But coming from a democratic system I obviously think otherwise. I don't even believe in god, so I certainly can't imagine being ruled by an autocratic leader. I would like to choose my leader and want to be able to criticize him when he makes a mistake.

The problem with an autocratic captain of a cricket team with unlimited powers is that there is no scope for out of the box sporting moments. Botham's heroics of 1981 headingly would not have happened under imran's leadership. Brearely asking botham to keep whacking the ball was an inspirational moment of a skipper recognizing his player in the zone and letting him be.

Imran kind of leaders decide what is right for everyone. They deliver sentimental speeches, win a few games, draw a lot more and when they retire the team goes back to indiscipline.

Autocratic leadership doesn't work if smart players are dictated by a captain who doesn't let them blossom. As a system such dictatorial captaincy creates insecurity and is divisive in the long run as it happened to pak cricket afer imran's retirement. Salman85 claiming pak team needs such dictatorship is sad to hear. As a team pak should develop a culture of equality and camaraderie like the present day indian team or recent australian teams that are ruling the world at the moment.

Why wouldn't Imran have allowed Botham to play his natural game? I see no evidence in Imran's captaincy history that he didn't encourage his players to play their natural game. He just insisted on discipline and demanded that the players act as a team. You are under selling his captaincy by a mile by saying he just delivered sentimental speeches and won a few games.

There are some institutions that cannot entirely be governed as a "democracy". The military is one of them. I tend to think sporting teams is another. You need a clear and decisive leader who makes the rules. Depending on the particular sports and the team's dynamics, this leader can be the captain, the coach, the general manager or someone else. And sure, the leader should respect everyone's opinions and consult when necessary. But in the end, the buck stops with him and the team needs to follow his directives. Considering the highly volatile and individualistic players that Pakistan have had in their history, I see no problem in Imran's autocratic style of leadership. Perhaps that style wouldn't have worked for India or Australia, but he was exactly what was needed for Pakistan.

 

[smash84]

I don't know what literature you are talking about. But coming from a democratic system I obviously think otherwise. I don't even believe in god, so I certainly can't imagine being ruled by an autocratic leader. I would like to choose my leader and want to be able to criticize him when he makes a mistake.
.

Dude I am talking about literature on China, USSR, and some of the East Asian economies. Of course they never practiced democracy as we have come to know Democracy. Hell even Singapore isn't very democratic. Try to say something about the Singapore leadership and risk jail but Singapore is almost like another Switzerland in terms of being so precise in everything. So there are PLENTY of examples of progress without democracy. The biggest advantage of having autocracy is that you don't get too many delays in decision making something that the consensus building style of democracy gets.

The problem with an autocratic captain of a cricket team with unlimited powers is that there is no scope for out of the box sporting moments. Botham's heroics of 1981 headingly would not have happened under imran's leadership. Brearely asking botham to keep whacking the ball was an inspirational moment of a skipper recognizing his player in the zone and letting him be.

Imran kind of leaders decide what is right for everyone. They deliver sentimental speeches, win a few games, draw a lot more and when they retire the team goes back to indiscipline.

Dude i really don't know what you are talking about here since Imran always wanted the players to go and play their natural game so I wonder where you get the notion of "no scope for out of the box sporting moments". He allowed the 2Ws, Inzy, and Anwar to play their natural game but he wanted an all out effort from them. He always expected 100% from them and he was only hard on the players if he felt that they were not doing as much as they were capable of or if they were not showing the amount of commitment as they should have.

And Imran was more action than words pal. He only delivered speeches rarely. Most of the time the players would get some real lashings from him for being slack in their duties which is why he was such a believer in the leading-by-example theory something that you seem to loathe for some reason. He was against delivering speeches and doing nothing afterward. I wonder where you are getting these notions from?

Autocratic leadership doesn't work if smart players are dictated by a captain who doesn't let them blossom. As a system such dictatorial captaincy creates insecurity and is divisive in the long run as it happened to pak cricket afer imran's retirement. Salman85 claiming pak team needs such dictatorship is sad to hear. As a team pak should develop a culture of equality and camaraderie like the present day indian team or recent australian teams that are ruling the world at the moment.

You seem to hit the nail on the head yourself when you use the words "smart players". I want to add crooks to that list as well. The Pak team was full of not so smart players who needed lots of guidance and Imran provided them just that.

Setting a system where there is continuity on the job for the players and the captain is something for the board to figure out and institute. Unfortunately that never happened in Pakistan. For such a usually balanced person I fail to realize why you don't see the turmoil that Pakistan cricket was in before Imran became captain? The first time Imran became captain there were a number of ex-captains playing under him. Please don't buy the revisionist version of a sweet and rosy history of Pakistan cricket, courtesty Sanz, which was ruined by a dictator who came along and ruined the whole institutions of a nation. Such a thing never happened dude. Just go and look it up.

 

[bagapath]

Nice to talk to both you guys at the same time. Always enjoyed our interactions.

I didn't say imran's leadership spoilt pak cricket. I had seen him lead his team to wins in india and england. And, under him, pak played as one unit. no one dared to fix matches and they all played to win. He was the straight forward, smart captain his country should be proud of. And the fans worship him. So, no arguments there.

Is he among the greatest skippers of the game? I don't think so because I think his style was flawed.

Anecdotal evidence suggests that he used to tell the bowlers what to bowl before each delivery. Akram says once he didn't start his run up because imran was busy at mid on doing something else and forgot to tell wasim what to bowl.

This may sound like a senior helping a junior. And some may like imran for this. Think again.

Great sports teams are not built on such tunnel visioned strategies. Miller tossed the ball back at bradman refusing to listen to him. Sehwag has gone against the advice of his skippers a few times. shane warne set his own field. So did murali. They all were team players who supported their skippers and made their teams great. But they sought and got the freedom to direct the game the way they wanted. Imran didn't allow his players to take charge. Only individuals taking charge at the right moments turn the tides in test cricket. Imran did it himself a lot of times. Other times he told people what to do. This worked only to a certain extent because pak was not a great test team under imran. It was a good team that anyway had good players. Without imran they might have underperformed, yes. But there is no proof that he made them better than their potential. And I believe it is because no one performed out of the ordinary for themselves. They did it for the skipper. (Who would later dedicate the WC win to his personal mission of building a hospital and not thank his teammates)

My take on his style is that he had such an iron grip on everything that people's instincts were stifled but no one had the balls to stand up to him. They all waited for his retirement and started the disintegration process once again. Their divisive nature and indiscipline were kept under check by imran, I know. That was good. But OTOH no one continued to follow his school of thought in team building after he was gone. That was because he made everyone seem smaller than him and they were looking for freedom from him. Ganguly-dravid-kumble-dhoni kind of continuity after him would have made pak no 1. But that didn't happen because, though temporarily effective, his autocratic style was not loved by his mates.

(I don't want to live in singapore or china. USSR disintegrated 20 yrs ago. Death to dictatorship. Long live democracy!! )

 

[Sanz]

Bagapath, Where do you rank Border as a skipper ?

 

[bagapath]

Bagapath, Where do you rank Border as a skipper ?

above imran and s.waugh, below m.taylor. all of them are in the top 15.

 

[JBH001]

I really appreciate your analysis regarding Imran's captaincy,Bagapath. The fact that Imran's captaincy was, in a sense, about Him ties into the fact that he was unable or did not think of setting a foundation for Pakistani cricket that would serve it into the future unlike such players as Border and Taylor for Australia or Ganguly and Dhoni for India. Speaking of sentimental speeches, Imran's acceptance speech, if IIRC, was perhaps the worst winning WC speech ever.

 

[bagapath]

He allowed the 2Ws, Inzy, and Anwar to play their natural game but he wanted an all out effort from them. He always expected 100% from them and he was only hard on the players if he felt that they were not doing as much as they were capable of or if they were not showing the amount of commitment as they should have.

imran never captained inzamam in test cricket. he led anwar once. and mushy in 3 tests. it is not fair to credit him for anything that happened in their careers. even waqar played only 11 of his 80 odd tests under imran. but i am willing to accept him as imran's protege because he started under imran; in fact, he and akram and salim malik are the ones i have in mind when i talk about the disintegration of pakistan cricket in the post imran phase.

but dont talk about anwar and inzy when we discuss imran's captaincy because he didnt have anything to do with them as a skipper. may be they were his fans, but that is a different issue.

 

[Sanz]

Speaking of sentimental speeches, Imran's acceptance speech, if IIRC, was perhaps the worst winning WC speech ever.

Why ? It was his team, he built it, his team mates were, although great players, mere pawns in their own eyes. Look at what happened in 1996, they had ,IMO, one of the best team in the tournament and better than the 1992 team. Do you really think Aamir Suhail would have displayed that kind of stupidity under Imran's leadership ?

It is one of those over analyzed speeches,IMO, And If we are crediting him for worst speech, let's also credit him for best speech ever( Cornered tiger speech).

 

[akilana]

oh man what's next imran was poor man's flintoff?

 

[Fusion]

Is he among the greatest skippers of the game? I don't think so because I think his style was flawed.

Anecdotal evidence suggests that he used to tell the bowlers what to bowl before each delivery. Akram says once he didn't start his run up because imran was busy at mid on doing something else and forgot to tell wasim what to bowl.

This may sound like a senior helping a junior. And some may like imran for this. Think again.

Bagapath, it's a rare time when I disagree with you. On the subject of Imran's captaincy, I couldn't disagree with you more strongly. Imran allowed and encouraged his players to play their natural games. The anectode about Wasim is from the beginning of his (Wasim's) career. He needed that guidence from Imran as he had no vast cricketing experience and had no clue what a game plan should be. Please keep in mind that Wasim didn't go through a solid first-class structure. He was picked off the streets by Javed and nurtured by Imran. When he first started bowling, Imran asked him how long his run-up was and how did he calculate it. Wasim replied that he had no set run-up and he just randomly picked a spot to bowl from each time! Once he got the proper guidence, Imran eased off and let him develop on his own. If Imran's method was wrong and he was hand-holding Wasim too much, then surely Wasim should've faded away once Imran retired? Instead, Wasim went on to have an all-time great career. I think that proves that Imran wasn't overbearing with Wasim, or other players for that matter.

Imran didn't allow his players to take charge. Only individuals taking charge at the right moments turn the tides in test. Imran did it himself a lot of times. Other times he told people what to do. This worked only to a certain extent because pak was not a great test team under imran. It was a good team that anyway had good players. Without imran they might have underperformed, yes. But there is no proof that he made them better than their potential. And I believe it is because no one performed out of the ordinary for themselves. They did it for the skipper. (Who would later dedicate the WC win to his personal mission of building a hospital and not thank his teammates)

Pak was not a great test team under Imran? As you yourself stated, they won in England and India. And they played the mighty Windies to a draw (they should've actually won a series if not for some faulty umpiring). If you compare the talent level of the Windies team to Pakistan's, I would strongly suggest Imran got his team to OVER-ACHIEVE. During the 1980's (the majority of Imran's captaincy career and certainly his peak), Imran was the only "great" bowler of Pakistan's. Sarfaraz's record against the WI is terrible. Wasim hardly played against them in the majority of the series. It was Imran shouldering the pace load for the team. Javed was the only consistent and reliable batsman Pakistan had. Pakistan had talent sure, but not to the level of the great WI side. Yet they battled them hard and almost bested them. I would say that's Imran's greatest achievement and a testament to his leadership skills.

My take on his style is that he had such an iron grip on everything that people's instincts were stifled but no one had the balls to stand up to him. They all waited for his retirement and started the disintegration process once again. Their divisive nature and indiscipline were kept under check by imran, I know. That was good. But OTOH no one continued to follow his school of thought in team building after he was gone. That was because he made everyone seem smaller than him and they were looking for freedom from him. Ganguly-dravid-kumble-dhoni kind of continuity after him would have made pak no 1. But that didn't happen because, though temporarily effective, his autocratic style was not loved by his mates.

Once again, I massively disagree that Imran's iron grip style stifled anyone's instincts. Inzi, a young inexperienced rookie, had free reign to play aggressive and attacking cricket in the very first World Cup he played! Wasim and Waqar were allowed to bowl their attacking brand of cricket. Imran even promoted and encouraged the unorthodox Qadir! Who's natural style did he stifle? As for why Pakistan disintegrated after Imran, that's more to do with the cricketing structure and the overall culture of Pakistan. We can have a long dissertation about it, but to make a long story short, Imran couldn't have any long-term impacts on the team unless he was actively involved running the PCB. It's unfair to expect Imran to cure all of Pakistan's abnormalities by himself. He needed competent and honorable men in the PCB to help him. He never got that.

 

[salman85]

@Bagapath

The concept of a democratic system cannot work everywhere.That is primarily why ideoligies differ.Pakistan cricket,and the country as a whole,has never been able to tolerate democracy.It is not just true of Cricket,but true of everything in the country.We need someone with an iron fist to be incharge.We might sing in favor of Democracy,but deep down everyone knows that the democratic individual will be torn to shreds in the not so distant future.

Ideally I wouldn't want to bring Politics here,but going through Pakistani history,it is easy to which periods where our most productive ones,and which ones were/are our weakest.Pakistani society in general,is not ready to embrace the concept of democracy yet.It is a fad in Pakistan TBH.I for one,have always wanted a dictator incharge of the country.People here will only work when someone at the top makes them work.It is a primitive mindset yes,but it's there.

When you think along those lines,it is much easier to understand why Imran's style was ideal for the team.True,things after him have not been of the same quality,but that is not down to the seeds Imran sowed,it is down to the fact that captains after him have not had the same authority.Inzamam was the only one after Imran who had a lot of authority,and the team did do very well under him.You knew that he too,was captaining the side with an Iron Fist.

In short,different nations,different mindsets.Whereas the concept of an autocratic leader might seem backward and primitive to the outsider,it is perhaps the only type of leader that can do well for Pakistan,in cricket and beyond.

Also,Imran's WC winning speech in 1992 is criticized unfairly.When you go through his interviews,he has said on numerous occasions that he lost his motivation to play cricket towards the end of the 1980s.That is why he retired in 1987.He was asked to come back by Zia-Ul-Haq,and then he led the team to that historic series against the West Indies,but his motivation level was still not high.The only reason he kept on playing till 1992 was the Cancer Hospital,since the board of directors had told him that if he does not win the world cup,he will not be able to gather funds for the hospital.He won the WC,and the rest as we know,is history.His only motivation between 1987 - 1992, was the Cancer Hospital,not personal goals or records.The WC was the icing on the cake,but his goal was the hospital.So you can well imagine how overwhelmed with emotion he was when he won the WC,and knew that the Cancer Hospital was turning into a reality.

 

[JBH001]

Why ? It was his team, he built it, his team mates were, although great players, mere pawns in their own eyes. Look at what happened in 1996, they had ,IMO, one of the best team in the tournament and better than the 1992 team. Do you really think Aamir Suhail would have displayed that kind of stupidity under Imran's leadership ?

It is one of those over analyzed speeches,IMO, And If we are crediting him for worst speech, let's also credit him for best speech ever( Cornered tiger speech).

Well, I am basing this on my recollection of his speech 18 years ago. I had a cursory look on Youtube and can't seem to find it so as to refresh my memory, but I remember thinking it was rather a selfish speech to give when his country (and team) had achieved something tremendous. If I am correct in my recollection, I see no reason to reverse that judgement; but, am also willing to credit him for his cornered tigers speech too, as that would be consistent.

 

[bagapath]

fusion and salman85

1. I dont think imran was a bad captain. I dont think he was a good captain, either. I think he was a very good captain. I just dont think he was great.

2. Imran did not screw up the Pakistan cricket team. He made them work harder. Taught them the right things to do to win cricket matches. Taught them to focus. But he did not make them perform beyond what they could have done with the available talent. Javed and Wasim had equally (stats-wise) successful stints as him at the helm. Even then, I know imran was a better captain than them. But I just wont rank him among the greatest in the game because nothing as stunning as the ODI WC win happened for them when he was the captain of their test cricket team. winning in india and drawing levels with Windies are good achievements. but even a ganguly has led india to a series win in pak and actually beat the no.1 team too which imran never achieved.

3. imran is not the reason for the pakistan team struggling to maintain the level of consistency they are capable of before or after him. but the methods he used to run his ship limited the scope of running the team any other way. no one was a designated no.2 after him that the team disintegrated once again. you cant blame the pakistan cricket board alone for this. while imran was at the helm, he was the master of his universe. he could have groomed the next captain had he had the vision.

4. even if he didnt specifically groom the next skipper, the next captain anyway could not learn much from him because imran was a tactically limited captain. there was nothing passed on from him to the next generation.

5.he never led inzy in tests. led anwar once and mushy thrice. he is not the reason for their great/good careers.

6. pakistan is still paying the price of zia ul haq's dictatorship for close to 10 years. all the foregin policy decisions and his take on religion/state have massively screwed up the country.dictatorship doesnt work anywhere because it is one man's decisions affecting everyone's fate.

 

[sachin200]

Reading all this, I want to tell you guys one thing

Earlier I used to think that autocratic rule is the best way forward but after hearing IMRAN that autocratic rule always hurts long term and democracy is always the best longterm that I started to believe that democracy is the best....

 

[salman85]

I'll let go of the dictatorship thing.Let's just agree to disagree.

Also,i'm not sure about Mushtaq and Saeed Anwar,but Imran definitley had a role to play in Inzamam's rise,even though he never captained him in a test match as you mentioned.I've heard Inzamam say this on multiple occasions.Imran's impact on Inzamam's career may not be as significant as it was on Wasim's career,but it was there.

Imran might have groomed a captain,but that is something we will never know because of the musical chairs played in PCB afterhim.Every new chairman appointed a new captain.In almost 20 years since Imran left the game,we have had an unlimited number of captains,which also includes people who were reappointed multiple times.Javed,Salim,Wasim,Anwar,Sohail,Waqar,Rashid,Moin,Yousuf,Younis,Malik,
Inzamam,Afridi,Misbah,Butt - And i might even be missing a name here or there.

The thing is,even if Imran had groomed a captain,there was no way that he could ensure that his protege would become the captain after Imran retired.Imran was never involved in board affairs after 1992.Had Imran been in incharge of PCB,then surely we would have seen the captain he groomed at the helm for an extended period,but that never happened.

Also,Imran retired in 1992.It was common knowledge that Javed would take over the captaincy after him.It should have also been Javed's responsiblity to groom a future captain,but even he didnt do that.Even though he had had multiple stints with PCB afterwards.I'm not shifting the blame from Imran to Javed,i'm only implying that Imran had no control over PCB after 1992,and all the good that he did was going to go down the drain as a result of the PCB's incompetence.

Comparing Imran to Ganguly isn't entirely fair,even though i rate the latter very high.India had the best batting lineup in the world.During Imran's time,Pakistan never had the best bowling or batting lineup in the world.Ganguly's India probably had an equally good,if not better batting lineup than the all conquering Australians.They Australians in turn,had a better bowling lineup than India.Imran's Pakistan on the other hand,was inferior both in terms of bowling and batting when it faced West Indies and they still took the Windies all the way.Not to say that Imran's side was poor,but the difference between Pakistan-West Indies was much larger than the differnece between India-Australia.

 

[smash84]

. but even a ganguly has led india to a series win in pak and actually beat the no.1 team too which imran never achieved.
.

Actually considering the fact that the Pak team was quite terrible in the 00s India's record has been quite poor against it especially losing the series once in Pakistan and drawing against it in its own backyard. As strong as the Indian team was during the 2000s it's record against Pakistan fell far short of how good it should have been. Ganguly also lost the home series to the number 1 side while never winning a series against Australia in their home. So while he may have won against the Aussie team he also lost against the same team in his own backyard.

3. imran is not the reason for the pakistan team struggling to maintain the level of consistency they are capable of before or after him. but the methods he used to run his ship limited the scope of running the team any other way. no one was a designated no.2 after him that the team disintegrated once again. you cant blame the pakistan cricket board alone for this. while imran was at the helm, he was the master of his universe. he could have groomed the next captain had he had the vision.

.

Dude he did groom Wasim somewhat which is why Wasim had a reasonably good run in the late 90s. Wasim used the similar style of leadership as Imran did of leading from the front. The 99 WC and the subsequent match fixing allegations led to Wasim staying away from captaincy. And I have re-iterated before that the board never allowed a captain to settle. Imran used the methods to get the best out of his team and the methods succeeded. He was not the one to appoint captains after himself to see who succeeds and him and who will not. The team went back to the old style of team politics once he left. As a captain he did not have the authority to change the whole PCB setup. To argue that he should have changed the whole functioning of Pakistan cricket while being captain of the team is quite unrealistic and quite silly really. His job was to lead the team while he played and the rest was the PCB's job. And I doubt tubby talylor and Waugh were doing succession planning. Lol if they were because Shane Warne was being groomed to be the Aussie captain but he never became one. Also Ganguly never did any succession planning dude nor did Dravid or Kumble. I doubt MS Dhoni has been grooming anyone for the next stint as captain. The board makes these appointments not the incumbent captain.

4. even if he didnt specifically groom the next skipper, the next captain anyway could not learn much from him because imran was a tactically limited captain. there was nothing passed on from him to the next generation.

5.he never led inzy in tests. led anwar once and mushy thrice. he is not the reason for their great/good careers.

So Imran was not tactically as great as some of the other captains but his man management was far superior to others. Tactically what exactly do you pass on to the next generation? Changing fields? What exactly did Mike Brearly pass on to Ian Botham the captain who as a captain lost 9 out of 10 matches????? What did tactically Taylor pass on to Waugh?????

And even though Imran never led them in tests he did groom Inzy and Anwar and Mushy for the ODI which had spillover effects in the test arena in their later careers which these guys admit themselves. I personally talked to Saeed Anwar once and he did say that Imran gave the players a kind of confidence that no other captain could. He was that sort of a man manager. The fact that he did so well without these players was a testimony to his great captaincy.

6. pakistan is still paying the price of zia ul haq's dictatorship for close to 10 years. all the foregin policy decisions and his take on religion/state have massively screwed up the country.dictatorship doesnt work anywhere because it is one man's decisions affecting everyone's fate.

Massive generalization looking at Pakistan. Just to take the opposite view put in Singapore and tell me why doesn't dictatorship work? Take China's example. How can you say dictatorship doesn't work? For all India's great pace of almost one and a half decade of strong growth China has been doing that for twice as long and at a greater pace. As I mentioned earlier that with the correct agenda in place a dictatorship is a more rapid model for growth than democracy.

 

[bagapath]

salman85, smalishah84 and others....

to be honest i dont consider myself smart enough to have an intelligent discussion on anything, including cricket. for me to get into a serious debate on dictatorship vs democracy would be really pushing it too far. how about we set our differences aside and get into a topic I am more comfortable with:
Which is better?

vs

tough one!!

 

[smash84]

salman85, smalishah84 and others....

to be honest i dont consider myself smart enough to have an intelligent discussion on anything, including cricket. for me to get into a serious debate on dictatorship vs democracy would be really pushing it too far. how about we set our differences aside and get into a topic I am more comfortable with:
Which is better?

vs

tough one!!

I'll go for J Lo. I do have a preference for women with some color ..........btw is Bipasha Basu Tamil too?

 

[akilana]

I'll go for J Lo. I do have a preference for women with some color ..........btw is Bipasha Basu Tamil too?

she's bengali..

are you saying white isn't a colour?