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*Official* Pool A Discussion
- Thread starter Simon
- Start date
V Reddy
International Debutant
I don't think their age is correct certainly not Hasan Raza's. They change their age in School Certificates. I came to know about it pretty late myself. I started playing seriously this year and so joined a college in which cricket was there and there are 5 State U-17 players in the team and one state Player who played in the U-19 player world cup in SAF for India. They looked very aged for me for their age and some of them were younger than me according to their age but i look as a kid before them. So when i enquired i found out that they change their age in the certificates during School. I didn't know about it till now. I am not getting any chances this year as they are settled in the team and we play only 20 over matches. Sometimes i get picked as a fielder and also i joined the college late and so they didn't even see me bat or field yet. I am waiting for next year as they will pass out of the college. So don't think their ages are correct. Most of them will be wrong :!( . I have big doubts over Hasan Raza age. They do it to play longer.Top_Cat said:
Top_Cat
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Actually he was 16 and a half.
I don't mean directly in the sense that you'd have Indian selectors running around shouting "My GOD!! Infant mortality is up!! Blood more youngsters!!"
I mean in terms that the definition of 'old' in Australia compared to India would be different, due to the lower life expectancy. It's the same with all of my relatives; I'm part Aussie Aboriginal and we have a life expectancy around 20 years lower than mainstream Australia. This means that someone who reaches 50 is looked upon as 'elderly' in the community whereas a non-Aboriginal Aussie at 50 would just be considered to be an 'older Australian'. Someone who is 60+ would be looked at as 'elderly'.This might go a little way to explain why I hear a lot of sub-continental posters referring to guys like Hayden, Langer and even Ponting at 28 as being on the 'wrong side of 25' when in Australia, they're still considered quite young. This attitude might have an impact indirectly on why younger players are picked in India and Pakistan. I'm just theorising here.
No Vishnu, you are dead wrong about Hasan Raza. there are players like Afridi, Waqar and others that are much older than their age on documents but Hasan Raza's age is corect. Majid Khan was the PCB boss when Hasan Raza was first selected to play for Pak & Majid khan made an unpleasent statement about Hassan's age.Hasan Raza then went though a medical test (successfully) to prove that he wasn't overage.vishnureddy said:
krkode
State Captain
If they think they can start at 15 and go till 35, why not start at 20 and go till 40?
Isn't their "fake age" only what the outside world sees? And does what the outside world see really matter to them getting selected to play?
Or does even the PCB not know about their "real" ages?
V Reddy
International Debutant
I don't think the PCB knows it too. They have a lot of advantages krkode. They can play in the young age group.They play in the U-15 when their age is above that. I am not saying that all the players do it. But i have found some doing it . Also do you think a player gets picked when in 30's to play for India or a state side when just starting to play well?If a player is playing well and if he is in early 20's then he will get picked and the same person will not get selected if he is around 29,30,etc,.krkode said:
Yeah, he was 16+. I confused that with his age when he entered the national arena like Ranji Trophy, Duleep trophy etc....Top_Cat said:Actually he was 16 and a half.
I don't mean directly in the sense that you'd have Indian selectors running around shouting "My GOD!! Infant mortality is up!! Blood more youngsters!!"
This might go a little way to explain why I hear a lot of sub-continental posters referring to guys like Hayden, Langer and even Ponting at 28 as being on the 'wrong side of 25' when in Australia, they're still considered quite young. This attitude might have an impact indirectly on why younger players are picked in India and Pakistan. I'm just theorising here.
1. Lower life expectancy is a result of the lower general standard of living and poorer health and hygiene conditions. This doesn't affect cricketers(here, I would like to stress that I am talking about international cricketers) because most of them come from a middle class background(in India atleast) where they have access to all atleast all basic amenities. Even if they don't to begin with, they will enter that strata of society and all its associated comforts and advantages once they start playing at international level.
2. Ok, so Hayden, Ponting and Langer are considered young now. They will still retire latest in their late 30s , won't they? There are only very rare instances of players(especially in modern cricket) playing well into their 40s whether it is Australia or India. Indian cricketers, barring the real injury-prone ones also last till they are in their mid to late thirties. So, where is the difference? Where does life expectancy come into the picture?(The average Indian life expectancy is well in the fifties or maybe sixties, so it's not like an Indian player in his thirties has one foot in the grave or something like that) I think the reason why these guys are considered "on the wrong side of 25" by subcontinental posters(BTW, I myself have said that about the "on the wrong side of 30" players, not the <30 ones like Ponting) is simply because Indian players are usually blooded earlier and by the time they are 25(if they last that long), they are veterans in the game and seem quite wise and somehow mature, yet with years left in the game. Now, there could be a variety of reasons for the early blooding of Indian or Pakistani sportsmen, but lower life expectancy even as a theory doesn't hold water.
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full_length
U19 Vice-Captain
It's just a difference in perception.
I think that the more relevant point is: there's no bias in India against players being selected when they've not turned 20. The idea is- if he's good enough then play him. My impression is that in England, if a player is less than 24, he's simply got to put in his time in the domestic arena before he'll be considered for the national team.
On the other hand, from seeing the way selectors have treated some players (Robin Singh for one), they do have a bias against picking players who are more than 33-34 years of age. They're going to avoid letting a 30+ player make his debut. Reason being that they are not seen as long term prospects at that age. There's always a younger alternative, who looks 'promising' for a long India career.
So there's a very cricket related explanation to it. The 'life expectancy' suggestion is interesting though
I think that the more relevant point is: there's no bias in India against players being selected when they've not turned 20. The idea is- if he's good enough then play him. My impression is that in England, if a player is less than 24, he's simply got to put in his time in the domestic arena before he'll be considered for the national team.
On the other hand, from seeing the way selectors have treated some players (Robin Singh for one), they do have a bias against picking players who are more than 33-34 years of age. They're going to avoid letting a 30+ player make his debut. Reason being that they are not seen as long term prospects at that age. There's always a younger alternative, who looks 'promising' for a long India career.
So there's a very cricket related explanation to it. The 'life expectancy' suggestion is interesting though
Top_Cat
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Again, I'm not really arguing that because of lower life expectancy, the Indian players should play younger etc. As you say, they are at least middle-class born in general. I'm just wondering whether the lower life expectancy of the population in India alters perception of what is 'old' and what is 'young' (two very subjective terms). It's possible that this perception from coaches, other players, selectors or the general public may affect how old a player is when he gets picked or dropped.
Mate, I'm not arguing causality here.
I'm just simply wonder whether said life expectancy affects perceptions of what is 'old' in sporting heirarchy which may affect selection. If you compare the median age for retirement (in a cricketing sense) with Aussies compared to Indians, I reckon you'd find a higher proportion of Aussies in the mid-30's bracket. Also, I reckon you'd find that more Aussies get picked in their mid-20's and late 20's than Indian players (who generally get picked in their late teens/early 20's or not at all). Now, I don't know why this is (I've not done any tests of inference or anything else) but I'm just trying to understand where the perception of players such as Rick Ponting being old comes from. I don't have a firm opinion yet, just observing. And it's similar here in Australia but occasionally, there are some exceptions made. Rick Ponting and Damien Martyn come to mind, and even then they both had at least two full seasons of first-class cricket behind them before they got selected.
No, it doesn't, not in cricketing terms anyway. As I mentioned in my previous post, IMO, it's just a derivative of the fact that we are used to seeing extremely young men being blooded on the international arena(it's not that we consider them at 16 or 17 as fully grown and mature adults and at 25 as old people). It's a risk which the Indian and Pakistani boards have been willing to take. Sometimes, it clicks, sometimes, it doesn't.Top_Cat said:
Comparatively, other cricket boards prefer to wait atleast till the players are in their mid 20s to blood them ie they don't prefer to take a risk of possibly nipping a promising career in the buds. When we see other men arrive comparatively late in international cricket, we tend to think of them as "older entrant", a relative term ofcourse.
As far as exits from international cricket are concerned, i don't know the stats for it, but if Indians leave cricket earlier than Aussies or the English, they are the ones who arrive earlier than their counterparts in other countries. So, the length of the career remains more or less the same. They don't leave because they are old and senile......