Being
the captain of a cricket team is not a ceremonial job, it’s a challenging
role that only a few can perform. Many, some of them the best cricketers we've
seen, have failed to cope with the burden of captaincy despite having ruled
over the sport with their unmatched cricketing skills. What's even more
difficult is to pick the right candidate for leadership.
When it
comes to Indian team, being a cricket captain is the highest pedestal which
every player aim for. The honour comes with 24/7 analysis and being the target
of an excess of emotions ranging from one extreme to another. India's
cricketing history has been shaped by its captains, as much as the great
batsmen and bowlers of this nation. In last
82 years, India has witnessed 31
skippers in Tests and 22 in ODIs. These captains have moulded the Indian
cricket team in many different ways.
Vijay Hazare
supervised India's first ever win in 1952, MAK Pataudi was famous for injecting India with that fighting
spirit, leading his team to its first overseas Test and series win in 1968. Kapil
Dev lifted the World Cup for
India in 1983. Sunil Gavaskar led the team which won World Championship in 1985. Mohammad
Azharuddin became India's most successful ODI skipper during 90’s.
Sourav Ganguly led a rejuvenation
Indian team which battered by match-fixing scandals, making them a force to
reckon with globally. And MS Dhoni reached
extraordinary success levels, before plunging into equally mysterious depths.
To
begin, one of the major points of argument when everyone begin to compare Dhoni
and Ganguly as captains has to be the time period & team strength. It is a
well-known fact that Ganguly never had the same quality of team Dhoni has.
Ganguly’s legacy will largely remain reinstalling people’s faith back in the
game, post the match fixing disaster, and laying the foundations a dominant and
aggressive Indian team which had the zeal to win, both in India and
abroad. However, everyone fails to recognize the existence of John Wright. He was also
involved in the process of rebuilding the team with Ganguly.
Ganguly
positioned the Indian Team as an aggressive unit, for the first time in history
people felt that Indian Team can give fight even in the difficult and
unfavourable condition. Be it the Great
Eden Garden victory against
Australia, the Natwest series
against England, India almost ruining Steven
Waugh’s farewell in Australia and the 2003
World Cup. Ganguly’s team gave us some memorable moments.
Ganguly
took important decision during his tenure like asking Dravid to keep behind the wickets, forcing Srinath out of retirement, asking VVS to bat at 3 at Eden Garden Test against Australia, shaping Sehwag and Yuvraj are the absolutely
brilliant work of his clever mind and no
gamble or luck involved.
Whereas,
in global events, Dhoni’s record is stupendous, winning both the major ODI tournaments, which are 2011 World Cup and 2013 ICC Champions Trophy. In addition, Dhoni also won the T20 World Cup in 2007, a format which
Ganguly missed during his international career.
Dhoni
showed discipline, guts, winning strategy and his innovative skills to the
team, he is the benchmark for the next generation captains. He took a brave
decision of dropping key players like Sehwag,
Gambhir, Harbhajan, Yuvraj and Zaheer
when they are not playing well. An interesting side to this is the
differentiation between bad and consistently bad performances. Our huge
population has significant fan followings of each of these key players. As soon
as one of them is dropped, we hear anti-Dhoni
statements from all the sides and criticisms on social networks. The moment
Dhoni scores less in 2-3 matches, the demands for him to step down reach the
skylines. Also it is most important to understand the difference between an
opener and a middle order batsmen. I wonder how one can justify the constant
place of Dhoni in the rankings if his form was so bad for long time.
To a
certain extent, the style of Dhoni’s captaincy combined with a good team and
made sure that India did not depend on one or two game-changing decisions for victory. He
took a responsible in developing Yuvraj
as the all-rounder, developing Jadeja
& Ashwin skills that are now showing results.
The
record speaks for itself. The Two World Cups, two IPL trophies, Champions
League, so many series wins, consistent ranking in the two main forms of the
game, constant selection as captain of World XI, consistent ranking as top 10
batsmen in ICC Player Rankings; these are only some of the large number of
statistics Dhoni has in his favour. Whereas, Ganguly’s team failed in the final
against the best team in the world, Dhoni’s men conquered that final obstacle at
home, winning the World Cup after 28
years.
The
results speak for themselves. India emerged as a stronger side
under Ganguly away from home in Tests. Having a poor record away from the
turning tracks at home, Ganguly’s Team India fought to change the popular
perception. Whereas this is the biggest spot in Dhoni’s otherwise glowing
captaincy record. 16 Test losses, 10 of them on a trot, have done
great damage to his Test credentials overseas.
Whitewashes
in England and Australia in 2011-2012, followed by winless tours of South
Africa and New Zealand in 2013-14, and an embarrassing collapse in England
after taking the lead at Lord’s in 2014, followed by the winless tour of
Australia has absolutely crushed fans’ confidence in his leadership in Tests
overseas.
Despite
an overwhelmingly poor record in Tests, Dhoni’s team has fared quite well in
ODIs overseas. It goes on to show how a change in format does wonders for
Dhoni. While Ganguly’s team was competitive across formats overseas, it’s only
ODIs where Dhoni’s leadership has stood good results away from home, as is
evident from India’s 2013 Champions Trophy victory in England, the same venue
where India lost 0-4 in 2011 and 1-3 in 2014 in Tests.
Despite
the popular opinion which once prevailed that MS Dhoni is a ‘lucky’ captain, the only ‘luck’ that works in cricket is at the toss of a coin. The rest is a result of
how a player performs on the field.
As a
skipper, Dhoni’s record is better than Ganguly as a batsman. However, Dhoni’s
record is skewed when it comes to home and away performances. In India, he
averages 51.75, but the number drops to 32.46 away from home. Ganguly averages
43.41 outside India, while his home record as a Test batsman is abysmal, with
an average of 29.93. Dhoni trumps Ganguly as an ODI batsman too, having
earned the title of the best finisher of his era. While Ganguly formed the
greatest opening partnership with Sachin, his statistics fall well short of
Dhoni's feats as an ODI batsman.
On the
other hand, under Dhoni’s leadership, Chennai Super Kings/Indian team
has been the most successful team. His innovative captaincy, maintaining a
sense of calmness, order around the team and personal performances as captain
has turned the tide for the national and CSK team many a times. Ganguly on the
other hand would lead in terms of player management, ability to take on
oppositions both on and off the field, and ability to win test matches abroad.
Under
Ganguly, the bigwigs – Sachin, Dravid, Laxman, Sehwag, Kumble and himself –
being the permanent fixtures, granted a more settled look to the Test side.
However, Dhoni has led India through troubled times. After the disastrous tours
of England and Australia, senior players have moved out and he has been leading
the side through some tough times. But if one looks at him as compared to
captains like Kapil or Ganguly, he tends to go on the defensive a lot more than
them. But he is not risk-averse and has taken some difficult decisions
throughout his tenure.
The
rational side would like to go with Dhoni, and the emotional side with Ganguly.
But given the way we approach Cricket, I would go ahead with Dhoni. For showing
all of us that we can beat Australia on their soil, we can lift ICC trophies,
we can chase consequently massive scores (350+)
against best bowling teams, and more importantly even losing with a fight &
discipline.
