I sometime thinks that why any other sports hero is not as popular as Sachin? E.g. Vishwanath Anand or Pace is also very good in their games. Then why only cricket?
Why we get involved so much in this sport?
I have my own thoughts on “Why cricket?” I have found top five reasons for why cricket is popular in India
1. We are lazy.. Yes, sounds strange but we (Indian) are little lazy. Not that we don’t do the hard work. We do. But we don’t race with time. If we plot graph of progress (or profit) we tend to put efforts or inputs on X axis rather than ‘time’. We do not like to measure anything against time. Many of us must be feeling weird when Match referee panelizes team’s captain for slow over rate.
Coming to the point, many sports like hockey or soccer are ‘time bound’ sports. First half of 35 minutes and next half of another 35. Whereas cricket is based on “deliveries” bowled by bowling team. Runs are on Y axis and overs are on X axis. We can stop the game at any logical point, say 34.5 overs, 230 runs. After each delivery there is a gap where we can relax (there you go!), think and plan.
2. We love mathematics - This one everybody will agree that we do lot of calculations. Cricket is the sport where we can analyze the scorecard after years also. Compared to other sports, we can not play graphs like what was calculation when 6th wicket was down. How many balls were in hand? E.g. If you want to see match history of hockey or tennis then it will be a text commentary that at so and so minute India
3. Cricket is talked more than played – We just love talking about cricket. I personally don’t play cricket but I follow the game more. And see now, I am not just talking but writing about it. No other sport gives us that much “time” to think, about “what should have been done?”. People have authority to talk about cricket. Typical line talked in Mumbai trains is “lefty right combination rahana mangta hai..”. No one says that Sania should have played that shot like this.
4. We need heros but still we are patriotic – Our history is making someone larger than life, follow him, worship him and try to become like him. Be it Kings, Superstars, Political Heros.. we always need someone whose pictures can be posted on our walls. Other team sports do not indentify or separate out individual performance as cricket can do. Who took wicket or catch? Who scored more runs? In hockey we can say who made how many goals, but how many such goals can one player make in a game?
Compare to other individual sports, like tennis or chess, we have heros there but that’s just not enough as there is no one to compare with. Sachin or Kambli, Yuvi or Kaif, Nehra or Zaheer, Kumble or Raju? These questions won’t come in those sports as there is no other achiever. Additionally, we love someone playing for nation. We feel it terrific when India Won banner comes on a big ground (which is true for Hockey also).
I saw more Indian flags on road on March 1, 2003 when Sachin scored 98 runs to beat Pak in 2003 World cup game.
5. Commercial Break – As I talked about it earlier, we get a logical break after each delivery and much bigger break when over changes. I think, this is the most influencing factor commercially for cricket. Any other sport doesn’t give this much needed liberty to TV channel to show commercials when the game is at its peak. Can you imagine, commercial break just before goal in soccer game. Also, we have drinks break, wickets, injuries, sight-screen disturbance, bad weather, bad light and many more reasons for taking “a short commercial” break.
Jagmohan Dalmiya, Lalit Modi, Bindra, Niranjan Shah all these are by-products of this commercial break. May be to promote Hockey, Suresh Kalmadi will come with new format of game where there will one break after every 10 minutes of game.
Sanjay Sonar
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