New Delhi: Like in life, one goes through the ups and downs in professional phase. In sports, one day you embrace glory and the other day you tend to lose form. Athletes over the years, in moments of their tough phase, often rely on help from veteran players to bounce back to form. Former India skipper Sunil Gavaskar, last month, had admitted that even some of the best players in Indian cricket like Virender Sehwag or Sachin Tendulkar, have often called him up for advice during their rough patch. However, he remains surprised that none of the present day India cricketers tend to follow that step even during their worst days as he took a sharp “ego” dig at them. Reacting on the remark, his former colleague Kapil Dev responded with a bombastic remark.
Speaking to Indian Express in June in the wake of India’s loss in the World Test Championship final, Gavaskar had recalled how he had once helped Sehwag improve his batting over a simple phone call but added that he has been left baffled at the reluctance of present day India players from taking advice from former cricketers.
“No, no one has come. Rahul Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar, VVS Laxman regularly came to me. And they would approach me with a specific problem and you could tell them something which you had observed. I don’t have an ego about this, I could go and talk to them but since there are two coaches — Rahul Dravid and Vikram Rathore – so sometimes you hold back since you don’t want to confuse them with too much information,” he had said.
Speaking on the topic in his interview with The Week, Kapil explained that while it shows confidence, the negative side to it is that these present day India batters feel “they know everything”. He in fact feels that the with the invasion of IPL in Indian cricket which has provided immense monetary benefit at an early stage in their career, cricketers have become “arrogant”.
“Differences come out, the good (thing) about these players…is that they are very confident. Negative point is they think they know everything. I don’t know how to put it better than that. But they are confident, but they think ‘you don’t have to ask anybody’. What we believe is an experienced person can help you,” Kapil said.
“Sometimes when there is too much money, arrogance comes. These cricketers think they know everything. That’s the difference. I would say there are so many cricketers who need help. When Sunil Gavaskar is there, why can’t you talk? Where is the ego? There is no ego as such. They feel ‘we are good enough’. Maybe they are good enough, but extra help from somebody who has seen 50 seasons of cricket, he knows things. Listening sometimes can change your thought.”
Agencies

KR Desk