The furore over Indian Cricket
The amount of sensationalism one see’s on TV regarding Indian cricket is mind baffling and at certain moments gets annoying. With bollywood stars now being hired to advertise the cricket game, this is a pure corporate madness. With every passing day, we wake up to see Sachin Tendulkar endorsing a cereal, http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Rahul-c83321 Dravid applying toothpaste to his sparkling teeth and so on, until the viewer bangs his head in the TV screen, breaking it. But, the cricket star-studded adverts never come to an end...
Since the inception of IPL this is getting worse by the day. Eat cricket, sleep cricket, and drink cricket and soon we’ll be hearing s**t cricket. Bollywood actors and actresses in flashy seductive dresses campaigning for their clubs in the Indian premier league, which provides great eye candy to the viewers, when all of a sudden we see a sweaty Indian cricket player l*****g his lips, and the viewer pukes his guts out.
Recently, Forbes released a list of the richest cricketers of the world. A mind boggling number of 5 Indian players are in that list, with National and International companies signing deals with many of those players. MS Dhoni is reported to sign a record deal of 43 million dollars or 2 (emphasis) billion rupees. So what do these players have to offer in return for this preposterous amount of money in terms of quality cricket? Three successive exits from the world T20 world cup, an embarrassing defeat at the hands of http://www.senore.com/Cricket/New-Zealand-c754, with the entire team bowled out for a meagre score of 88, their 5th lowest total in 749-one day internationals.
The once cricket sensations are no longer players; they are now brands, and unfortunately the glam and cash of the fashion world is rotting their inborn talent. With players getting so much attention, they are starting to act and sound like s****. celebrities, who have little to offer but Botox and laser surgeries. With all due respect to legends like Sachin Tendulkar, who is without a doubt one of the best players the cricketing world has seen; it has taken him almost 2 decades to prove his mettle unlike the emerging players who have been given just a tad bit more attention than they truly deserve.
This recalls the mind numbing TV commercials, with Yuvraj spraying deodorant in his hairy armpits. Cricket lovers don’t want to see that, it makes them writhe in agony. What we, the fans want to see is that the team performs well in matches, on the field, competing against quality teams and coming up. The Indian cricket team and many of their players have been put on a pedestal and elevated to a God-like status. With pretentious advertising campaigns before tournaments like the T20 world cup worth spending of millions of rupees, what we have at the end is the Indian team shamefully exiting the cup.
Would it be too much to ask, if the veteran players instead of preferring to be glorified on media, walks out on the cricketing field to win the hearts and mind of the crowd, and show minimal level of modesty.
The very thing that differentiates Sachin Tendulkar from the lot is his modesty. Other than him, most of the players are snotty and arrogant over a list of non-achievements. If the Indian nation wants to see the Indian cricket team performing well in its matches and tournaments, then it will have to cease giving so much attention to players who have yet to prove their worth in terms of cricketing credentials.
This brings us to question the worth of the IPL, if it has failed to hone an Indian Cricket team that has the determination and grit to compete successfully in the cricketing arena. If the Indian players are more interested in doing commercials and torturing the audience by having to see their beautiful faces day in and day out then it is advisable for the BCCI to let them continue with their advertisements, and hire a team of young cricketers from the national level with Sachin Tendulkar as their captain.
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