No army can have two generals
Sunil Dev
Editor's note: Sunil Dev was manager of the Indian team that toured South Africa and Zimbabwe, under Sachin Tendulkar, in December 1996-January 1997. What follows is the verbatim transcript of his report, submitted to the Board of Control for Cricket in India, at the conclusion of that tour.
Prem Panicker's detailed interview with Sunil Dev, on the issues raised here and on various other matters of cricketing importance, follows on Tuesday.
I am grateful to the Board for appointing me as Manager of the
Indian Cricket Team to tour South Africa and Zimbabwe in 1996-1997.
I had tremendous exposure to the standard of international cricket,
different infrastructural facilities provided, the attitude and
hospitality of South Africans and the people of Zimbabwe.
There
are a few important features and observation of this tour which
I would like to mention, with a request that if they are not implemented
then I feel I was wasting my time to put it in my report.
Dress code: I recall from the photographs of Indian cricket teams
in DDCA, in the 70's and 80's, that the players would wear various range
of colours and clothes, it is very sad to see that nothing had
changed since then. While we were set to travel, it was amazing
to note that we had different sets of official blazers, various
ranges of trousers, so much so that two players were not even
provided with official blazers. I was surprised to know that players
were not aware of what shirt was the formal attire. By my repeated
requests, 3 white shirts for each player were bought, with considerable
reluctance of the officers in charge, until Mr P M Rungta intervened.
So the proud international Indian team, with different colour blazers and
trousers and two members without the official blazers left the
shores of India on 18th December, 1997.
To quote an incident, when we were to meet President Nelson Mandela
on the ground at Capetown in front of thousands of people, one
of our cricketers had to wear a blazer given to him by me, which
was obviously without the Indian crest. Another point where one
needs to take into consideration is that it is the name of the nation
that is at stake is the kit provided by the sponsorer. We were
delivered the kit at 8.00 pm on 17th December, knowing that we
are to leave at 3.00 am of 18th December. The confusion in distributing
the clothing to all 17 members was very harassing, both for the
players and for myself. Here, one must consider the agony the players
have to go through because of poor management. The clothes provided
were of such poor quality that the logo itself faded after 2 washes
and the dress started looking shabby. I would like the Board to
consider the appointment of an individual, who is directly responsible for the timely
delivery and quality of the clothing provided to the team. We
must not forget that we are representing our nation and cannot
afford to taint our reputation.
Travel: When a person plans his/her travel, all factors of
travel, stay etc, are taken into consideration. But when a group
travels, every day and hour are planned meticulously, step by
step. Even if one step is unorganised, the whole sequence is disturbed.
In this entire tour, starting from our departure to our return, there was
no responsible person present to take the responsibility of
travel, neither from the travel agent nor from the Board. While
on return, the national team should be received with the required
amount of dignity, we had to face problems with excess baggage
and we were told that 25 kgs is the weight limit. It is unreasonable
to expect two months of travel, with the cricket geat and personal
belongings to be accommodated in such a weight category. Had our
travel agent been a little more responsible, these arrangements would not have been a big issue.
While making such an important cricket tour, the board should in advance
discuss the itinerary in detail, especially with a person who has
full knowledge of the country we are travelling to, and the weather
and playing conditions of different grounds. Most important
is that the host country should be advised in advance about our
practice schedule, and other relative requirements pertaining to
net practice and type of food required for players, and even practice
bowlers required for the net practice.
It is important to mention
here that when we host teams in India, we always have doctors on the ground with all the required medical facilities, but on our tour, though the players were insured for major
injuries, but at the same time for minor ailments like viral fever,
sore throat, etc., every time I had to pay their doctors available
on the ground to get the boys basic treatment. This issue should be settled before tour, as we
Indians our very hospitable and emotionally driven towards the
welfare of travelling teams but it is not the same abroad.
Cricketing aspects of the tour: With the considerable experience of hosting foreign teams and
having discussed the matter with different tour managers and listening
to stories of different tours or incidents of cricketers on tour,
I must say my team behaved exceptionally well both on and off
the held.
Payment to the team: In my opinion, match fee plus logo fee should
only be paid to 11 playing cricketers for a particular game and
probably 50 per cent to the reserve players, because I feel this
will motivate and inspire the cricketers sitting in reserve to
play in the first XI instead of sitting and doing nothing during
the match, knowing they will be paid the same amount anyway.
Considerable emphasis should be given to physical conditioning
of the players. I will not hesitate in admitting that South African
and Zimbabwe players were head and shoulders above the Indian team in this regard, which was apparent in the fielding and running
between the wickets; when we were failing to convert singles into
doubles, the opponents' running between wickets was of the highest
standard. With the lack of stamina, a batsman may well lose his
wickets and bowlers may struggle to keep line and length.
Two very important points I would like to mention here are:
a) Appointment of the Captain: Appointment of the captain is extremely
significant for the discipline, camaraderie and team spirit and
a will to win. Without being prejudicial to any name, I would like
to mention here that once a captain retires as captain, he should
also retire from the team as a player. Too many personalities,
big names and former captains in the same team will never bring
the team to the required level of dedication towards their objective
of winning the game, which is the ultimate. In the past, we have
had this precedent in India of changing the captains from
within the side to lead the country, and as I recall from Sunil
Gavaskar to Kapil Dev and vicer-versa, again back to Kapil Dev.
It has also happened that while one person led the side, three former captains were also present in the same side at the time.
I feel we should take examples from the other countries and keep
the captain as long as possible. At the moment groom and keep
Sachin Tendulkar as a captain, for as long as he is fit to play for the
country. This will help in forming a formidable side. Sachin has
all the qualities of a good captain -- cricketer of world class,
gentleman and a great ambassador for the country. No army can be
commanded by two generals and no company can be run by two managing
directors.
I feel we are making our cricket team play too much cricket. One
must realise that the Indian team has been constantly playing for the
last 5 months, and there is further travelling to the West Indies for the next 3
months and, on reaching home on the 11th of May, they have to
to play their first match of the Independence Cup on the 13th of
May. We are burning out the strength of our cricketers and even
their interest towards playing cricket. I must explain here that
the team was in no spirit to play in Zimbabwe while returning
from South Africa. With the result that they lost at Bulawayo
without giving any fight to the opponents, and were very pleased
and relieved to know that the match at Harare was being washed
out. Before it is too late, we must consider giving a space of at least three weeks between tours.
I was surprised to learn in South Africa that the BCCI had given some
kind of authority to Mr Sunil Gavaskar to discuss any matter on
playing conditions and to take a decision, if required. This was
also confirmed to me by Dr Ali Bacher. I as manager of
the team feel that if such a mandate was given to Mr Sunil Gavaskar as Chairman
of the board's technical committee (which as a Board member
I am not aware of), I should have been informed.
Role of the ICC Referee
I am not aware how the appointment of ICC referees are done and
whether all the Boards have their say in their appointment or
not, but I must insist that the Indian Board must put their foot down
and insist on their opinion to be considered in the appointment of the referee
when Indian team is travelling abroad.
I personally have nothing against the appointment of Mr Barry
Jarman, but a few incidents on the Tour made it quite evident, by which
even a layman could say that the ICC referee was biased. For
example, Srinath was deliberately hit by Hansie Cronje, captain
of the South African team, while taking a single in the first Test
match at Durban on the first day. Despite my repeated requests to Mr Jarman
to produce that tape for us to judge the incident, he did not
oblige. I received lots of faxes and telephone calls about the
same from India, asking me to raise the question with the authorities.
In another incident, Pankaj Dharmani and Saurav Ganguly were fined
25 per cent of their match fee by Mr Jarman, after having a meeting
with the managing committee, accusing these two players for their aggressive
appealing for a catch against Adam Bacher at Johannesburg in the third
Test match but he (Jarman) could not show us the recording of the incident,
saying the video machine was out of order. On my discussing this
incident with the Indian press and commentators, nobody even
appeared to have noticed any such aggressions by the players named, that day.
The world saw Alan Donald's outburst at young Rahul Dravid in Durban
in the (one day) final when Donald was being thrashed all over the ground.
I immediately went to the third umpire's room and protested against
Alan's behaviour to the match referee, but to my astonishment,
he was the only man in the stadium who was not convinced of a
foul play by Alan Donald.
In yet another incident in the third Test match at the Wanderers
in Johannesburg, everybody could make out the way the ground was
being dried, and hardly any equipment was available with the
organisers to make the ground available and ready for play. Valuable time was lost
and India was denied what would have been its first ever victory over
South Africans in South Africa. I was surprised -- under what rules
of ICC the umpires were directing the Indian captain which bowler
to be used in the last two hours of play.
Before the first Test Match at Durban, the Indian team management
was called for a meeting to suggest that we should agree to play
the Test match under lights with a red ball in case of bad light during
the Test match and Mr Barry Jarman was advocating this case and
trying to convince our management that we should be friendly
and agree to this condition. I enjoyed my battle of wits with
the management of South African board, Barry Jarman, Hansie Cronje
and officials of Natal and finally, when we did not obviously agree
to play under lights, Mr Barry Jarman said that he would speak to ICC and would
be ready with the answer the following day before the toss. But
I did not see him the next day and to my surprise Dr Ali Bacher, managing
director of South African Board, went on record by telling the
press that whereas the South African team had agreed to play under
the lights, Indian team refused this request. The Indian cricket
board should take this matter up seriously with Dr Ali Bacher and
his remarks in the Press, and also Barry Jarman's role.
Last but not the least, I was reprimanded under section 3 and
8 of Code of Conduct of playing conditions on my remarks
on Sachin's controversial catch by Jonty Rhodes at Durban in the day and night
match against South Africa. I am enclosing the letter for your
perusal. I had merely suggested that in such cases the third umpire
should be consulted. After my meeting and deliberations with
the match referee and umpires, it was amicably resolved, but I
must say that the manager of an international team should not be answerable
to the match referee. This point should also be taken up by Board's
representative in the next ICC meeting because the logic is the manager
of different countries are members of their respective Boards,
and are not paid employees of the Board (barring few exceptions).
The Board must consider and recommend action against Mr Barry
Jarman at the ICC meeting and to discuss the matter of manager not
coming under the preview of the match referee.
Role of Dr Irani as Physiotherapist: No comments, reserved. (It will be discussed in the full meeting of the Board.)
Role of Mr Madan Lal as Coach: Mr Madan Lal has been a very hardworking cricketer and a very
sincere player towards his state and country. He continues on
the same path as a hard working coach and sincere in his endeavour.
He wants the cricketers to work hard and wants to win every game
they play and thus, sometimes becomes temperamental with everybody
around him, Mr Madan Lal though is very sincere to his job and
genuinely works hard.
I hope my report is taken in correct perspective and appropriate
actions to the suggestions are considered.
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