The future of Indian cricket

India is currently the top-ranked team in the world in the sphere of test cricket. Of course, there are many who continue to refer to Team India as “flat track bullies”, and will point gleefully at India’s recent capitulation to the Proteas in the first innings of the first test at Centurion Park as another piece of evidence that disputes our ranking.

If India had won the toss and put South Africa to bat in those conditions, who knows how much the Proteas would have scored in their first innings and what may have happened to the match? But be that as it may, for all this is today only speculation.

What is not speculation is that soon, Dravid, Laxman and Sachin will retire. Perhaps Sachin too will stop enjoying cricket and decide to retire. What happens then? It happened to the mighty West Indies team of the 70s and 80s. After the Packer days, in the late 1970s, Australia too had to rebuild. With McGrath, Warne, Gilchrist, Slater etc. gone, the Australians have not had it easy in the last couple of years.

Don’t forget that Sehwag, Dhoni and Zaheer too are not exactly spring chickens. Unless India unearths and bloods new talent soon, we will be in a similar situation.