Subject: The Writer in You - entry To: stumped@cricinfo.com Time to Plan for the Future Anand Natrajan Wed Oct 23 11:47:51 EDT 2002 With another home series win under its belt, the Indian team basks once again in the adulation of its fans. The encomiums this time are deserved - there is no shame in roundly trouncing a weak team. The West Indies are a shadow of their past self, and the Indian team is ferocious at home. Living up to the weighty expectations these two conditions engender is a feat in itself. However, success can be ephemeral unless it is planned for. Repeatable success is far more satisfying than occasional success notwithstanding any old adage about absence (of success) making it fonder. How can the Indian team make winning a habit? There are three keys: 1. Reward consistency, punish inconsistency. 2. Innovate. 3. Build for the future. Reward consistency, punish inconsistency The Australians are the masters of this strategy for building tough teams. Past performance has not been a good shield for star players when they become inconsistent. The travails of the Waughs, Geoff Marsh, Allan Border, Craig McDermott and others points to a sound understanding in the Australian Cricket Board of a golden lesson: Past performance does not win present matches. So it must be with our team. For a change we have enough talent waiting on the bench; about seven batsmen, five bowlers and three stumpers at hand. We should pick the best eleven from these for _every_ single match. A place in the Indian team should be assured only on the twin criteria of fitness and performance. And as far as performance goes, consistency beats flair. I would gladly choose three batsmen who are guaranteed to score 70 over three others who may score 0 or 150. It's not the average that's important - it's the distribution of scores over several innings. An extreme example of all-flair-but-no-consistency is the present Pakistani batting. Surely we do not want to be bowled out for 50-odd runs in consecutive innings simply because our batsmen have the potential to score 500 runs once in a while. Innovate The Indian team has the rare luxury of having players who can perform multiple roles. Harbhajan bats, Sehwag bowls, Dravid keeps. When in a position of strength, as in the current series, I'd like to see the Indian team innovate so that it has strategies for later. For example, a pet personal innovation is to have Sehwag and Tendulkar open in one-dayers. Promote Yuvraj and Kaif up the batting order occasionally. Have Tendulkar bowl leg-spinners for longer spells. Or have Khan bowl around the wicket. Experiment with green, fast pitches to find out who's our best bat for the initial overs. Have Kumble open the bowling to pressure the opening batsmen who rarely get to play spinners, and also to give the pacemen an education in bowling with older balls. Occasional changes in strategy can often yield surprisingly good results. Remember Mark Greatbatch lobbing the ball in the swirly New Zealand air in the 1992 World Cup? Or India having Ravi Shastry to open the Indian innings in the 80s? What about Azharuddin's gentle medium pace or Amarnath's for that matter in the 1983 Prudential Cup? Innovation is not just exciting, it can uncover real gems. Besides, it accustoms players to different scenarios, which will occur even if we have consistent players. Build for the future Much as we may desire, we cannot expect our best players to continue playing and producing infinitely. This very team won't be around 10 years later. We must keep blooding younger, newer players often. We don't have to adopt Australia's much-maligned rotation policy, but we can institute a policy wherein we bring in 2-3 new players once a series has been won. This is the time to do it - when we are flush with victory. It's hard for a new player to shine when defeat casts its shadow left and right. But in the rosy glow of success, even the unlikeliest player can carry a candle, and that's exactly what we need - a steady stream of heroes, down to the point where heroics are not a surprise. Thrilled as I am with India's recent successes, what I like best are the clinical victories, not the heroic victories. I fear the herioc victories are rare, but the clinical ones can be duplicated and repeated. We should be aiming for that kind of performance.