In appreciation of Dadaism

My impression of Ganguly changed the moment I heard him give his first pre-match interview. I was used to Indian captains parroting the same old lines after every toss. To my surprise, Ganguly spoke quite decisively, articulately and intelligently. He seemed to have more in his rhetorical arsenal than just the usual cliches. As time went on, I went from being irritated by him to an admirer. I disliked his running between the wickets, and his slackness on the field. But I grew to admire a spirit that he seemed to be transmitting to the rest of the side: confidence and aggression. For better or worse, he saw the team as his, and the players (especially the younger ones) as his "boys". This kind of paternalism was a much needed one in the Indian cricketing context, which all too often, features the bumbling, restrictive hand of authority, but not the nurturing, guiding, or quite simply the "I've-got-your-back" one. Ganguly provided some of this and by simply acting like he didn't care about reputation and authority, made it cool for the younger brigade to not indulge in hero worship when it came to the rest of the cricketing world. Leave the hero worship to the schoolboys, he seemed to say, we're playing international cricket here. It was completely and totally unsurprising that the man who would do the most to inspire a modern Indian cricket team (and help it overcome its diffidence abroad) would be the one that would cop the most flak from international press and players. If he didn't, he'd have been doing something wrong.

Folks will write chapter and verse about his dazzling strokeplay through the off-side, and his useful, partnership-breaking bowling. (Some will write chapter and verse on his technical deficiencies). What matters for me in the ultimate analysis is that he was able to inject, in some small measure, a particular sensibility into Indian cricket. One that says "You took your shirt off to celebrate tieing a one-day series in my house; how about I come over to yours and take mine off to celebrate a real win?" When you get what that means, you'll get Dada.