Dravid, cricket’s Methuselah

A recent piece of statistics confirmed our worst fears.

Rahul Dravid has faced most deliveries in test cricket’s history. A staggering 29,125, before he resumes the self-flagellation in England.

It goes with the 15,124 in ODIs and 1303 in T20s. None of these, however, are likely to improve unless Ramalinga Raju does the computation for ICC. Put them together and Dravid has faced 45,552 deliveries.

For argument’s sake, let’s assume every delivery took two minutes.

After all the sightscreen has to be moved, the batsman has to make sure the rival skipper has not sneaked in an extra fielder, the non-striker has to conclude his chit-chat with the mid-on fielder wherein both inquire about the female members in each other’s family and so on.

Also, the ball has to be licked, rubbed, roughened, scratched and its seam assaulted – with nail, both human and iron, bottle-openers and even Afridi’s teeth – before the bowler starts his run up.

And if Shoaib Akhtar is the bowler, a batsman can afford a quick power nap without risking oversleeping as the Pakistani’s grunt would wake him up just in time to face the ball.

You can safely say Dravid has spent an estimated 91,104 minutes – quite a Lalit Modiesque number -- for the deliveries he faced in international cricket.

Any stout calculator will tell you that is slightly more than 1518 hours, which is nearly 64 days.

To give you an idea, it’s exactly the time a brow hair takes to grow back after it has been plucked.

Now it takes a lot of patience to do that and Dravid has been patient. In fact so patient that was promptly drawn to a doctor who became his better half. Three-quarters, if you fuss.

Returning to the point, if Dravid looks like cricket’s Methuselah, you know why.

He faced 45,552 deliveries, mind you. And that excludes his wife’s two.

Live Irani Trophy Updates...Day 3

1022: It's drinks out there and tea for me. The tea served in the Press Box reflects the prosperity of Gujarat -- thick, full cream milk and 'kuncham kuncham' elaichi as well.

1112: Chetanya Nanda resembles Kunal Kapur of 'Rang De Basanti' fame, isn't it? Fellow long-hair Ishant Sharma keeps reminding me of Mowgli. And they say Dhoni can play Tarzan.

1146: MS Dhoni probably realises if there is any threat to his Test captaincy dreams, it's Sehwag. So a slogsweep, fierce drive and a reversesweep off the Delhi captain. Half of Dhoni's shots could be traced to woodcutter's manual. On one occasion, he apparently attempted to cut the ball into half and Mithun Manhas' palm must be sore now after stopping it.

1302: Did I keep quiet for long? Blame it on the sumptuous lunch. Anyway, Dhoni seems hell bent to prove he would have made an equally effective left-hander. Just reverse swept his way to his 23rd fifty. No prize for guessing the bowler, Sehwag. This was the fourth occasion he reverse swept aside Sehwag!

1320: Well, blacksheeps are not that difficult to find and apparently we have shot ourselves in the foot. One of the TV reporters yesterday went to Rest of Inda team hotel and because he was not obstructed by anyone there, he filed a story on how it's unsafe for the players (I presume he wished to be obstructed). His channel added enough spice to the half-baked stuff and projected how a human bomb could easily make his way to the hotel. Stung police authorities have now reacted by barring everyone - except staff and boarders - from entering the hotel. Those of us who had lined up interviews are now left twiddling thumbs!

1325: BCCI continues raising the bar when it comes to logic-defying. Chief selector Dilip Vengsarkar and his colleagues Venkatapathy Raju and Ranjib Biswal were here for the tie. What for? After all, they are not going to pick the squad for the series against Australia, it would be the first assignment of the next batch. In other words, the selectors who were here won't pick the side and those who would pick the side are yet to be officially unveiled. So what was the logic behind the extire exercise? I would love to believe it was BCCI's parting shot to the outgoing selectors.

1330: Mowgli bowling to Tarzan and hits him on the pad. No appeal. Ishant is mature beyond his age and knows can't afford to antagonise Dhoni. Of course it hit Dhoni little high but Ishant had broken into Tarzan screams against other batsmen in similar situations. Smart boy.

Team India gets stung by sting

(The Great Indian Muddle...AP Photo)


As if we did not know it, Aaj Tak, along with its English-speaking sister Headlines Today, carried a sting operation where the selector quartet of Ranjib Biswal, Bhupinder Singh Sr, Venkatapathy Raju and Sanjay Jagdale ‘reveal’ a dressing room riddled with infighting and ego clash. And how ominous Greg Chappell was. The highlights are:

Bhupinder Singh Sr: "Greg wanted to show everybody he is the boss. He was not happy with anybody. There were instances when Chappell was not talking to senior players for 4-5 days. He was not on talking terms with Sachin Tendulkar, Virender Sehwag and Harbhajan Singh. It happened in South Africa.”

The North Zone selector says Chappell had a "divide and rule policy" and was the additional ego in a team full of egos.

He also said that Rahul Dravid had problems with Sachin Tendulkar and Sourav Ganguly. They were not supporting Dravid, says Bhupinder; some players were backing Tendulkar, some Ganguly. "They are sensing that if he fails then we have a chance to become captain."

Ranjib Biswal: "Greg could not understand Indian cricketers' psyche. He was more like a schoolmaster than a friend."

Sanjay Jagdale: "I won't call it factionalism but there were some personal problems.”

Jagdale also reveals that S Sreesanth and Zaheer Khan had fought in the dressing room.

Niranjan Shah: "Endorsement money is so huge, there is a chance of a grey area. They will get money if they are in the team, otherwise they won't. That's why. it [pressure from sponsors to retain them] may be there. That's why the board has said only three endorsements per player."