Sunil Gavaskar - The world's first bionic man

[C_C]

What does Gavaskar know about today's cricket (in terms of playing and travelling) to make a remark like that ? It is much easier to talk crap and accuse current players of whinning about 'excessive Cricket' than actually doing it. And yes Standing in the slip for 3 days when you dont have a fast bowler isn't count much for fielding.

And yeah Sehwag has had a very long tough Gruelling Career what is that 5 years ? How many ODIs did Mark Taylor play ? Steve Waugh didn't play ODIs during last two years of his career and stopped bowling since god knows when. Inzi, doesn't do anything else apart from batting and involving himself in ugly runouts snd still gets injured a lot of times.

For a person who is quite an astute commentator and a former match refferee, i would imagine that Gavaskar has quite a good grasp of what is involved in today's international cricket.
Regardless of Inzy's injury problems, the fact remains that he's had a very prolific career- 300+ ODIs and 100+ tests in a 15 year career span. That is pretty gruelling.
Steve Waugh played considerable cricket too- 150+ tests and 250-ish ODIs is no joke and he too lasted a long while ( cant really fault a man over 35 decieding to quit one version of cricket). Point is, tubby batsmen can still very much survive in today's 'gruelling' schedule and Gavaskar too, would probably have survived.

I expected you to ignore the links about Tendulkar and Gavaskar and come up with the bullcrap you do every time. N gave you a count of no. of first class games played by Gavaskar and Tendulkar both premiere batsmen of their era

It is quite irrelevant as i didnt compare Gavaskar to tendulkar in the first place.
I said that too much cricket per se isnt the problem- too much travelling is. You'd notice that almost every single bonafide international player from the 70s and 80s who also plied their trade in English county cricket have more days/year on average in their careers than almost all players today. Which is precisely my point- too much cricket isnt the problem. Whether Gavaskar played a truckload of cricket in his day isnt the issue here. The issue is there are plenty of former international players who played far more cricket than what players do today.

And that travelling is because of Cricket, something you fail to understand and continue with your load of ******** . Tendulkar has played 250 ODIs more than SunnyG and do you know how much travelling that involves.

I did note that it is too much travelling, not too much cricket.
And no, too much travelling isnt because of more cricket played.
If you have 5 3-test series a year instead of 3 five-test series, you end up travelling more. Simply because it is much more start-stop in nature. BCCI in the 90s for eg. used to spread their ODIs around less - it used to be Mumbai-Kolkata and a few cities within 500 miles of those centres that hosts the ODIs and switched around the major cities per tour. Now teams are flying from one end of the subcontinent to another.
Its more of a travelling circus today which it definately doesnt need to be.

 

[Langeveldt]

And that travelling is because of Cricket, something you fail to understand and continue with your load of ******** . Tendulkar has played 250 ODIs more than SunnyG and do you know how much travelling that involves.

It doesn't have to mean loads of travelling.. Look at baseball in the USA.. A match pretty much every night, but a series in the same place, so they don't have as much travelling..

Although I guess in India they have to play ODI's in all the random outposts like Guwahati, so you can't use the baseball system

 

[C_C]

Although I guess in India they have to play ODI's in all the random outposts like Guwahati, so you can't use the baseball system

i think the issue of regional development and broader cricketing exposure around India is justified.
What i dont like is the stupid scheduling per series.
Okay so outposts like Guwahati, Dharmasala, Tripura etc. deserve a game or two per year.
And the middleweight cities like Hyderabad, Kanpur, Lucknow, Gwalior, Cuttak, Ranchi etc. deserve a few games per year too.
All fine and dandy.
But does the average 7 match series have to be something like Mumbai-Guwahati-Dharmasala-Kolkata-Chennai-Ahmedabad-Delhi, followed by : Kolkata-Gwalior-Trivandrum-Ranchi-Mumbai-Lucknow-Chennai kinda deal every single series ?
Why dont they host one ODI series in western India, next ODI series in eastern India, next in North, etc etc. ? a Delhi-Dharmasala-Chandigarh-Gwalior-Kanpur-Lucknow-Delhi or Chennai-Trivandrum-Bangalore-Panaji-Hyderabad-Bangalore-Chennai schedule would be far lighter on travelling and if the series are alternated between regions, it would make for far easier travelling and maintain player freshness.

 

[Sanz]

It doesn't have to mean loads of travelling.. Look at baseball in the USA.. A match pretty much every night, but a series in the same place, so they don't have as much travelling..

Although I guess in India they have to play ODI's in all the random outposts like Guwahati, so you can't use the baseball system

Well Baseball cant be compared to Cricket anyway, Cricket is an allday event compared to Baseball which last few hours at best and they usually play in the evening when the weather isn't extreme.

 

[C_C]

Well Baseball cant be compared to Cricket anyway, Cricket is an allday event compared to Baseball which last few hours at best and they usually play in the evening when the weather isn't extreme.

True. But the baseball season is a lot shorter too- cricket really has no season-ender. It badly needs a season-ender, where teams just get to rest 2-3 months at a strech.
On second thoughts, i dont think a collective 2-3 months off can be accomplished in cricket due to schedule conflicts of various nations ( largely weather driven).
But i think individual countries could work a 2-3 months off period in their calendars.

For eg, Indian/Pakistani players could have Nov-Dec off when the weather is nice and they could get a decent vacation, while scheduling the hottest phases (June-August) as away tours in places like England/Australia/New Zealand etc.. Australian players could have July-August off and play Dec-Jan in places like the caribbean or Sri Lanka.
West Indian players could have April-May off and play their rainy season months in places like England or South Africa.
I am sure this could be accomplished if the scheduling of the game was altered a bit.
Instead of 4 3-test series, its better to have 2 five-test series and 1 3 test series.
Instead of playing 7 series meaningless ODIs or and a meaningless ODI series like this India-Pakistan in Abu Dhabi kinda stuff, they could host a 3 team ODI series in Abu Dhabi kinda stuff 4-5 times a year around the world.

 

[vic_orthdox]

Bigger breaks between series, for mine, is what is needed. And let the tours be over 8 weeks, don't try and cram 3 tests and five one dayers into 5 weeks.

 

[marc71178]

If you add up the physical aspect of the game (ie, how many days you are spending in the middle), you'd find that players back then played more days of cricket/year than players today do

I don't remember sides playing 15 Tests and 30 ODIs a year even 10 years ago.

 

[vic_orthdox]

I guess you could argue that 10 years ago, there may well have been a "decrease" as such in cricket for the elite players, where those who were embedded in the Test sides weren't playing County cricket (nor were any heading to other countries to play some FC cricket, a la the 80's and some players in Aus), while the International program wasn't nearly as hectic as what it is now.

 

[C_C]

I don't remember sides playing 15 Tests and 30 ODIs a year even 10 years ago.

Yes, i am sure, in your awesome english comprehension skills, you took 'days playing cricket per year' to equal ' international games only'.

Malcolm Marshall ( for example- i am picking someone who played in the 70s/80s and also played in the county cricket circuit) has 440 One day games, 327 3-day FC games and 81 tests. Spread over 17 years.
Which works out to be 1826 days of playing cricket in those 17 years. Thats roughly 110 days of cricket/year.

Now do the same for someone of today's era for example McGrath. Its 65 FC games ( some 3-day, some 4-day), 119 tests and 273 one day games in a 13 year span.
Even if we say all FC games McGrath played were 4 days long ( which wernt- it went to 4 day format midway through his FC career but whatever), it works out to be 1128 days of playing cricket in 13 years. That works out to be approximately 85 days playing cricket/year.

Do the same for many players through the 70s and 80s.

And before you whine about ' but but but you are assuming that ALL matches went to 5 days or 3 days when it didnt and not everyone has the same rate of matches lasting all the days blahblahlbah' stuff, just keep in mind that is a 'reasonable' approximation and even with SIGNIFICANT inactivity ( ie, lets say Marshall's team was so uber that he never played a test going into the 5th day), it still makes one, atmost 5 days/year difference.
As long as you keep your calculations exact ( lets assume all matches went to their full 3-day/5-day limit - it will give you a fairly accurate measure so long as you keep the same assumption for all players), its a fairly easy calculation.
And 110 days/year of cricket is significantly more than 85 days/year of cricket.

You will find that to be a common aspect of a lot of players who played in the 70s and 80s and were either in English county cricket or had significant FC activity in that they were part of.

 

[honestbharani]

Gavaskar would be probably not be picked for ODIs anyway, if he were playing today. So easy for him to say. After all, we don't hear Langer, Kumble or Laxman complain about excessive cricket either, do we?

 

[adharcric]

Gavaskar's doing too much talking these days. He never experienced the modern-day ODI load. Why do you think guys like Kumble, Laxman and Warne are left out or personally stay out of ODIs and not Tests? Because ODIs require a higher level of fitness and take a greater toll on cricketers, which Gavaskar doesn't have a clue about apparently. Yeah everyone can say "I'd sweat 365 days a year for India", hell I'll say that too but these guys are not machines.

 

[C_C]

Gavaskar would be probably not be picked for ODIs anyway, if he were playing today. So easy for him to say. After all, we don't hear Langer, Kumble or Laxman complain about excessive cricket either, do we?

Meh i dunno about that. Near the end of his career, he did show marked adaptation to ODIs. He also has a few near run-a-ball tons/90s against a WI quartet comprising of the most successful opening combo ever- Holding and Marshall.
Just that his idea of ODIs is today's player's idea of 20/20 - just cant be arsed. But if Dravid is anything to go by, technically near-perfect batsmen like Dravid,Gavaskar, Sobers etc. would've probably adjusted quite well if it was necessary.

 

[vic_orthdox]

Guess the other thing about comparing FC games to Test matches is, as C_C himself acknowledged, the mental strain of playing a FC game isn't nearly as great as that of a Test match, nor a List A to an ODI, therefore the mental exhaustion and pressure is a lot greater than what it would have been 20 years ago (for example)

 

[marc71178]

Precisely Jack.

When it suited him he had supposed proof that the top players never tried in County Cricket.

Now he's decided they did make an effort...

 

[C_C]

Precisely Jack.

When it suited him he had supposed proof that the top players never tried in County Cricket.

Now he's decided they did make an effort...

Dude, not playing at the same intensity does not mean they arnt sweating it out in the grounds.
I am merely commenting about the amount of cricket being played and that in itself isnt the major bother.
I believe that the major difference in cricket today and cricket 6 years ago is not as much as proliferation of matches as shortening of test series ( to cram more series in per year) which results in far more travelling around.
Obviously FC cricket isnt played with the same intensity as Test cricket and too much test cricket can lead to mental fatigue. But my comment is intended towards the crux of the article - where Tim May's contention of 'their bodies are extremely fatigued' is brought into the picture.
And i am sorry but playing 40 days at 60% intensity is more physical work than playing 10 days at 100% intensity- intensity is largely a component of the mind, not the body. whether you are astutely planning around and trying to bowl a specific delivery or simply running in full steam and hurling it, it is still pretty much the same physical work.
Perhaps the adage ' international cricket is 90% mental, 10% physical' escaped you or perhaps, in your usual urge to be snide, you completely misrepresented my point.

 

[Dasa]

Precisely Jack.

When it suited him he had supposed proof that the top players never tried in County Cricket.

Now he's decided they did make an effort...

You're clearly misrepresenting C_C's point in order to have a go at him. Surely you can see the point he is making, especially when other forum members have supported his contention. He was making the point that in terms of actual playing days, they're not playing any more than they did in the past. However, there is a great deal more international cricket and a great deal more travel which could explain all the complaints about tiredness and burnout.

I don't understand why you feel you have to deliberately misrepresent people to make a petty comment, then depart without responding when you've been proven wrong.

 

[quick4mindia]

I don't know how the Indians feel about Sunil but, to me at least, he comes off very arrogant. In the Bangladesh V Australia tests, whenever he and Wasim are next to each other...Wasim seems much more humble. Sunil seems dismissive and reluctantly agrees on certain issues, but gives you the hint that he thinks you're wrong and he's right.

Because most of the times he infact is

 

[quick4mindia]

Gavaskar's doing too much talking these days. He never experienced the modern-day ODI load. Why do you think guys like Kumble, Laxman and Warne are left out or personally stay out of ODIs and not Tests? Because ODIs require a higher level of fitness and take a greater toll on cricketers, which Gavaskar doesn't have a clue about apparently. Yeah everyone can say "I'd sweat 365 days a year for India", hell I'll say that too but these guys are not machines.

Gavaskar was a very good fielder at closin in positions. So he must be fit. He was nearing his end of career when ODIs were played too seriously.

 

[marc71178]

You're clearly misrepresenting C_C's point in order to have a go at him.

No, I am just pointing out that when it suited him these players weren't trying, but now it suits him that they were.

 

[Dasa]

No, I am just pointing out that when it suited him these players weren't trying, but now it suits him that they were.

1. He never said players didn't try at all in FC/County cricket - he said they don't treat it as seriously as international cricket and don't play to the best of their ability.
2. He never said in this thread that they DO try.

You're manufacturing your oh-so astute points in order to support your vendetta against certain forummers.