Sir Garry v Sachin

[honestbharani]

The trouble with rating the Indian "cricket fans" is that so many of them who just want to scream for Sachin still end up referring to themselves as "fans".. My cousins, whom I play a lot of cricket with, all well educated and in very good jobs, still do not understand the difference between being hit outside the line of offstump and the ball pitching outside the offstump. These are guys who go bat**** crazy if you say one negative remark about Sachin... And these are guys who play cricket very well (or at least played it very well when we were reasonably serious about it), who can make good calls on what strategy to adopt at what time during a game. Yet they never watch a neutral game unless something spectacular is happening (the 434 game or the recent ABDV innings) and they just do not care enough to make considered remarks about cricket. For them, cricket means to cheer their favorite player and for the past 10 years, it has always been Sachin or one of the guys Sachin likes. They have an almost unexplainable dislike for Rahul Dravid for instance, and yet think Yuvraj, Harbhajan and Sehwag should all come back to the side (all known Sachin buddies)..


And talk to them and they will immediately recognize themselves as "serious cricket fans"...

 

[harsh.ag]

Not being charming bit is kinda true. Never a leader of men either. More an inspiration for men. More Dalai Lama, less JFK.

 

[ankitj]

I remember being at a party two years back, and people saying the players they would love to see the most. When it was my turn, I happened to mention WG, Hobbs, Headley, Larwood, Lindwall, Kanhai, Bedi, Amar Singh, and Sobers.

There was a pin drop for ten seconds, before someone said, "Yeah. Great.", and the conversation moved on.

Often people know Sobers though. And Bradman. Other than them, unlikely they'd have heard of any pre 1970 cricketer.

Did no one call you a pretentious **** at the party?

 

[longranger]

To be fair, Kanhai and Bedi are names you'd expect most Indians to recognize

 

[archie mac]

Who would be the most adulated players throughout history?

Sobers
Sachin
Viv
Miller
Bradman
Imran
WG
Trumper

In Australia there is no comparison - Bradman miles ahead of Trumper and Miller. Even though I try not to purchase books on Bradman as I already have too many, I have 10 to one Bradman compared to the other two

 

[archie mac]

If you open this question out to the entire history of the game then it's worth looking at this week's book review - will the first book published in 2080 be about Sachin? I rather doubt it

Good question Fred. I sometimes wonder if I wasn't an Aussie whether I would have Bradman so far in front of the rest. Confident that common sense would guarantee I saw Bradman as the clear greatest figure in the game. He retired from Tests in 1948 and they are writing more about him now than ever before.

 

[harsh.ag]

Barry Richards to be the new SF in 2080.

 

[G.I.Joe]

I remember being at a party two years back, and people saying the players they would love to see the most. When it was my turn, I happened to mention WG, Hobbs, Headley, Larwood, Lindwall, Kanhai, Bedi, Amar Singh, and Sobers.

There was a pin drop for ten seconds, before someone said, "Yeah. Great.", and the conversation moved on.

Hipster.

Why no contemporary player? Oh look at me, I know of many players of yore.

I'd have passed you over without comment too.

 

[harsh.ag]

It was a list of fifteen, condescending mother****ers!! Wasim, Waqar, Ambrose, Holding, Gower, and Deano were among the names too.

 

[G.I.Joe]

You say it like it clarifies the situation. Pick 3 players and move on. 15 names, FFS. No one asked for a thesis.

 

[Kirkut]

I've observed that in cricket statistics only play a minor role in determining a player's greatness, most of it is what kind of relationship does the player have with his game, how much he enjoys the game.

Now Andrew Flintoff has taken only 226 wickets in 79 tests (2.89 wickets per match) which is even lower than Ishant Sharma's 187 wickets in 61 tests (3.065 wickets per matches). Yet Flintoff has a celebrity status in Australia and UK owing to his 2005 performance and is featured above Waqar Younis and Allan Donald in Warne's list of great cricketers.

 

[marc71178]

May I suggest that there is far too much convenient stereotyping of Indian fans that happens over here? You wouldn't fully appreciate and understand their psyche unless you have spent lot of time with them or you are one. Indian fans know cricket. Period. They assess players on their merit and they are pretty much spot on in that with two exceptions (1) when it comes to Tendulkar, they can't accept anyone being better and (2) they are not often concerned about history of cricket.

Except for when they talk about Indian quick bowlers...

 

[harsh.ag]

You say it like it clarifies the situation. Pick 3 players and move on. 15 names, FFS. No one asked for a thesis.

What kind of graduate school did you go to?

 

[OverratedSanity]

Lol @ talking about Indian fans like they don't watch any matches not involving their team. It's the same for every country's supporters.

Not just that, look at the majority of commentators from Australia and England and its painfully obvious from how they talk that they don't watch any cricket apart from the Ashes. They're just ignorant about most other series,especially ones involving teams like SL, NZ,etc.

 

[smash84]

*And when we're smashing your lot (which doesn't happen a lot sadly).

On Tendulkar. I don't think outside of India that he's going to remain such a revered figure, at least from the impression I get. And most of the comments on his greatness largely allude to how adored he is in his home country than abroad. For Indians the appeal is obvious, but outside of them I don't think he had the charisma or game to make people adulate about him the way they might with a Sobers or a Bradman - or even a Viv.

This seems a very typical anglo(west) centric view imo. Outside India, you have Pakistan, SL, Bangladesh (and dare I say places like Malaysia where there is a fair bit of bollywood or kollywood influence) and Tendulkar would by far be the most well known (roughly translate to popular figure) among cricketers than say a Viv, Sobers, Bradman or anyone.

 

[G.I.Joe]

What kind of graduate school did you go to?

School of hard knocks, bitch.

 

[GIMH]

cricket apart from the Ashes.

What's this?

 

[honestbharani]

What's this?

something where your lot might actually have a chance to win

 

[Red]

@ankitj

As a generalisation, do you think indian fans like the shorter forms more than tests?

 

[ankitj]

@ankitj

As a generalisation, do you think indian fans like the shorter forms more than tests?

Yes, that's right.