The writing on the wall

So Sourav Ganguly has been dropped from the Indian team. The reaction to this has, naturally, been very bipolar.

Though, come to think of it, no matter when the decision would have been taken it would have been a contentious one. His exclusion from the team would not have created a controversy only if he had announced his retirement, which in any case would not have been likely for another 4-5 years had he continued to be in the team. So the selectors were placed in a dilemma.

They supposedly decided this in 5 minutes. Having done so, I wish they had spent an additional 55 discussing how to announce this to the public. Then their reasons for exclusion, which have come under considerable ridicule, would not have provided additional fuel to the fire.

I have intentionally not linked to any of the articles that discuss opinions on this issue. There are way too many of these. Oddly, one thing keeps popping up - almost everyone is questioning "why now" (i.e. after his Delhi performance) rather than "why not". The overall consensus being that he deserved to be able to go out on his own terms. But his "terms" did not match the selectors "terms" so this decision was inevitable.

And if I hear one more time that he scored 15,000 runs and deserves a spot .... grrrrr. By that token G.R. Vishwanath, Kapil Dev, Mohinder Amarnath and all the other greats who were jettisoned before they wanted to retire should still be playing until they "had a chance to leave on their own terms".

My frank opinion? He should have been in the 15, but not in the 11. If any of the batsmen got injured (or lost severely lost form) then he should have been next in line to replace them. That way he could still be a mentor to the youngsters and we would have a viable experienced batsman as a back-up option. And how long should he continue in this role? As long as he continued to show form and fitness in the first-class matches that he would have to play during the non-Test period to show that he still was capable of playing at the highest level. If experienced footballers can end their careers playing as substitutes, why not Sourav?