Opinion Cricket should be a contest between two teams,not a media tussle

I read the article and I saw neither any proof nor any suggestion of the proof and it got me thinking.

January 13, 2012 01:11 AM IST First published on: Jan 13, 2012 at 01:11 AM IST

A few days ago an old friend of mine in Australia wrote an article that said Virender Sehwag was causing a rift in the Indian team. I read the article and I saw neither any proof nor any suggestion of the proof and it got me thinking. Did he hear it himself? Did he have access to people who would tell him the truth about it? Did it strike him as an interesting thought while in the shower? Did someone whisper it to him? And I wondered what would happen if Sehwag sued him and the newspaper? Could they hide behind the old “we can’t reveal our sources” line that is sometimes essential and at most times a flimsy excuse? And what if Sehwag then used the same “won’t reveal sources” line and called him,say,a deranged lunatic and the newspaper a source of terrorist funding? Where does it end and,more relevant to us,where is it taking reporting of sport?

Predictably,the Indian media took it up amidst desperate attempts to find a sinister meaning to a go-carting excursion. And on Twitter,many people asked me “to give it back to them” thus raising the possibility of a second contest on tour. But surely our job is to report the only contest there should be — on the field of play,between two sets of players. Or do we fall into the trap of believing that we are part of the plan to dismantle the opposition? Do some of us run the risk of thinking we take a wicket or two as well?

In 2007-08,soon after the extremely ugly events of Sydney,I asked one of the reporters from the Australian,a newspaper that had routinely cast an acerbic,contemptuous look at Indian cricket,out to dinner. To be completely honest,I was very keen to know what kind of person he was and I almost expected to meet someone full of hatred. Instead I made a friend,found him very sensitive to different cultures,with a love for travel and history but also someone who talked about the compulsions of having to project a certain stance for the public.

I disagreed because I refused to believe that cricket followers who pay good money to follow sport are driven by this jingoistic nonsense; certainly I did not meet a single Australian in 2008 whose views echoed that of the newspaper. I found instead that the people of Australia,inevitably great sportslovers and admirers of a good contest,did not believe that the behaviour of their team and the stance of the media was representative of them as a country. You only have to see the extremely warm reception that India’s cricketers have got from crowds in Melbourne and Sydney as proof.

Sensationalism

I hear similar arguments from reporters of news channels; about the need to sensationalise,even to be vitriolic,because that is what the public wants. Every statement is an affront,a challenge,almost as if it is inspired by a politician addressing a rally. I was once at the other end of a telephone line awaiting my turn and I thought I was hearing a script that Salim-Javed might have written for Amitabh Bachchan in Deewaar.

Now I could be completely wrong and I could be rightly accused of not knowing how the rating wars work but what I do know is that the people in the media I looked up to and still do,those that are most widely respected,don’t feel the need to take sides,or deliver speeches on air,or take wickets in their columns. They don’t go to war every day. They describe,they inform,they paint a picture and they put things in perspective and the much maligned “public” seems to like them doing that.

And so,I wonder as I look ahead to a cricket match,not a media tussle,in Perth. Are we leaving the right legacy? Have we been custodians of the game as we expect others to be? Do we do in our profession what we lambast others for doing in theirs? And have we got this whole business of sport wrong? Do we,in spite of the posturing at press conferences,look for too much into what is essentially a contest on a field of play between two teams?