Unless you’ve been living under a rock – or hate cricket (the latter is less likely right now), you’ve heard something about Sanjay Manjrekar’s commentary and Ravindra Jadeja’s reaction to it. One could dismiss the unseemly spat as a nonissue and forget about it. However, the issue is symptomatic of some of the problems that plague cricket in India.
Ok I am fairly indifferent to Sanjay Manjrekar’s commentary. I feel that he is neither excellent nor awful. He has a certain insight born out of his own cricketing experience and sometimes makes pointed observations; otherwise, he is reasonably humdrum and run of the mill on the mic.
Others, however, are quite violently opposed to Manjrekar’s brand of commentary. As they mock Rameez Raja, they express their displeasure with Manjrekar. From time to time, we have seen anti-Manjrekar Twitter hashtags trending. We also had numerous people post screenshots of muting the commentary during live telecasts when his commentator was on.
In the past, Manjrekar has said less than complimentary things about cricket players, as this tweet about Ben Stokes from last year indicates. In the past he had also committed the grievous crime of questioning the ability of Virat Kohli: “I would still drop VVS & get rohit in for next test.Makes long term sense. give virat 1 more test..just to be sure he does not belong here,” he had tweeted in 2012. Twitter doesn’t forget; the tweeple have remembered now, with a vengeance.
Manjrekar spoke about Ravindra Jadeja and called him a ‘bits and pieces’ cricketer; as such unsuitable in some situations. Jadeja was clearly not pleased and tweeted this in reaction. He belittled Manjrekar's own cricketing credentials and called out what he termed as the commentator's ‘verbal diarrhoea.’ He received huge support for this; with 44k retweets and 15k largely supportive comments; including ones that called for Manjrekar to be fired.
This incident shows how a lot of Indian cricketers consider themselves stars; above criticism. Manjrekar was simply expressing an opinion; albeit a critical one, which is very much a part of his job. As someone who plays for the nation; Jadeja should have been able to take the criticism, but took umbrage instead and launched an ad hominem attack. By his logic, no one who has not played cricket extensively should ever be able to commentate.
However, our cricketers have become so used to adulation, that they seem to have started believing in their own myth. In the past, commentator Harsha Bhogle found that his contract was not renewed after he incurred the displeasure of some powerful team members. Bhogle’s commentary during the World T20 was not as flattering of Indian players as it could have been and M S Dhoni, Virat Kohli and Murali Vijay had let their disproval become known. Last year, Kohli had famously asked a cricket enthusiast to leave India and live elsewhere because a non-Indian and not Kohli was his favourite batsman.
These incidents reveal several problems. Firstly, of course, there are our cricketers: talented, flamboyant, rich as Croesus; but thin-skinned, with a massive sense of entitlement. They expect adulation and seem unable to stomach public criticism. Secondly, there is this type of unspoken censorship that commentators appear to have to abide by. Toe the line or your job is in danger, is the message that seems to be going out.
Superlatives and expression of fawning admiration are more acceptable from commentators than incisive comment or insightful criticism. There is an expectation that the commentary should centre around Indian players and not dwell too much on the achievements of non-Indian players. It seems clear that dissent is not welcome; even if it makes sound cricketing sense.
I for one don’t want to hear commentary that breathlessly waxes eloquent about the prowess of Indian players while skirting actual issues. I want to hear what mistakes players or selectors made; what lessons there are for the future. I don’t want one-sided gushing. I prefer insightful, expert and incisive comments that rely on experience and cricketing knowledge preferably laced with some intelligent humour. And I certainly don’t want Indian cricket players to be treated as Gods who can do no wrong.
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