Time for a Cull

I (Nasser Hussain) have always said India play better cricket when they play with passion and fire. India can't do things on a cricket field in the old-fashioned way, the quiet, Indian, easy-going way. By and large, Indians are friendly, happy-go-lucky people so it may come naturally to them, but for me, they don't play their best cricket like that anymore. They have to play with passion and fire. It's something Sourav Ganguly gave them in his captaincy and I've seen a lot more of that ability to scrap and fight in this Twenty20 side.

When Andrew Flintoff had a go at Yuvraj Singh, he gave it back to Flintoff by hitting six sixes off the next bowler. Back in England, someone tried to wind up Zaheer Khan through the jelly beans saga and Khan ended up being a man of the series. When India visited Australia in 2001, Ganguly wasn't intimidated by Steve Waugh. Harbhajan Singh bowled them out and the Indian team fought back, down to the last man. That's what I mean by passion and fire.

It's difficult to keep that energy stoked all the time on a long tour but in a T20 tournament lasting two weeks you can do that, especially with the younger boys. It's amazing just what one or two changes can do. In the World T20, India had more than a few changes from the side that I saw playing ODIS against England, and it changed the complexion of the way they played. A team reflects the style and attitude of its captain and the Indian team is starting to reflect Mahendra Singh Dhoni a little bit, in an extravagant, outgoing manner. You saw it on the field all the time, in the celebrations every time a wicket fell, in the support a bowler got even when getting caned.

Maybe it is the nature of Twenty20 cricket that brought out this quality in the Indians, as this is a highly-charged occasion. The way Yuvraj and Dhoni were batting was a massive plus for India. Being in Durban was a lucky bonus for them Africa felt they were playing away from home, and Australia was away from home.

As I watched India strangle Australia, I thought, if they play the final on the same ground the next day, India would win without a problem.

Twenty20 is a game that is suited to India because it's a game of flair and it's a fairly simple game. When batting, you see the ball, you hit the ball. It's not a game where you need to be overly fit, you just need to be talented and you need natural, raw ability. And you can't tell me that Indian cricketers don't have a natural ability. You only have to drive around Mumbai to see young lads play and realize that they are naturally gifted young cricketers. In India and England, for some reason, they don't want to take advantage of that. I think Greg Chappell tried injecting youth into the team, trying to get in players like Suresh Raina and moving out guys like Ganguly. When India played the ODIS against England, I just kept hearing the same old names. Like, with all due respect, Ajit Agarkar; he's a decent cricketer but nothing more. So I think they needed an injection of youth and they've got that in the World T20.

While at the T20, I got into a taxicab and the South African driver said that the one team that should be very good in the next decade is India. People here were used to the Tendulkar’s and the Dravid’s, but for the first time, they saw just how well Yuvraj could bat, what Rohit Sharma could do, how R.P. Singh swung the ball. There's a lot for India to do, but it's an exciting time, it's an interesting time to be watching from the outside.

It is how India handles the gains from this event that will be revealing. The natural reaction is for people to say, get rid of all the senior players. I certainly wouldn't. You don't go from a whole bunch of old players to a whole bunch of young players. It just does not work. You look at any sport, you look at Manchester United, you look at any team. Australia, for instance. I faced a similar situation when Duncan Fletcher and I took over in 1999. We were at rock bottom, we had been knocked out of our own World Cup, we lost to New Zealand and were the world's second-worst side, and we did- n't have the talent the Indian side had. Some of the selectors were saying, get rid of the old guard, and get new players in, but I wanted a few senior players to set the tone in the dressing room. I wanted Alec Stewart, Mike Atherton, Darren Gough, and a few others on my side.

It's a gradual process and you need good, solid, senior players to guide the youngsters. You probably don't need that in a T20 tournament spanning two weeks, but say it's a three-month tour of Australia, where the lads haven't played, or the Pakistan series. When things start going the wrong way, you need the senior pros to guide the younger players.

In Test match cricket, I would retain the gems, the fab four of Dravid, Tendulkar, Ganguly, and Laxman. They are world-class Test players. We saw in the England series that you can still amble on at your pace Indian pace if you want to call it that in the field and get away with it. They dropped some catches, but they got away with that as well. They weren't very mobile on the field, but if Sachin gets his runs, along with Ganguly, Rahul Dravid and VVS Laxman and the left-arms bowl, they will continue to be a good Test match side.

But in ODIs, I think, maybe it's time for a bit of a cull. I think India should do it one at a time. As Laxman has now gone from the ODI side, it is probably time for one more to go. The problem with Indian cricket is politics. This is what coaches find, what Chappell found, and what the selectors find. The moment you name one person, half the country is split. You only have to go back to the Ganguly episode. You try and do things for the forward movement of the team and all that it does is create a political situation that divides the country.

The one person I certainly wouldn't give up on yet is Tendulkar. I interviewed him for my newspaper and he still came across as someone desperately in love with the game. He wasn't just doing it for the money or the sponsors or because he's got nothing else to do. Talking to him was like talking to Graham Gooch or Stewart, who played cricket because they absolutely loved the game. I asked Sachin a question about what he was going to do after cricket. He sort of looked at me blankly because this is what life has been for him since he was a 10-year-old.

From what I saw of him in England, I wouldn't certainly call time on Sachin Tendulkar. The only thing with him, and it was noticeable in England, is that his body is beginning to fall apart a little bit because of one-day cricket. He admitted that the first thing that would give way wouldn't be his mind, which looked very sharp and strong, it would be his body. Dravid is one person that India should hold on to for as long as possible in some way.

I'm not sure about ODI, so I won't make any categorical statements about that. But whoever takes over, be it Dhoni or anyone else, will need Dravid around as a shoulder to lean on and also to see how Dravid goes about his business. He's a little bit like Stewart, very meticulous, very organized and a very good example. In these two weeks, the World T20 has found its place in cricket. I'm not of the argument that T20 will eventually take over everything because there's a place in sport for variety. In golf, there's your weekly tour events, the President's Cup, and the Ryder Cup.

It doesn't mean the Ryder Cup is the be-all-and-end-all of everything. You have to go back to your Masters, go back to the weekly tour. It's the same with Twenty20. It will stand like it is, a one-off tournament, played every two years, which is great. Twenty20 will be played domestically or at the start of a series to spice things up, or maybe at the end. I don't think it will kill 50-over cricket or Test cricket. There will be T20 specialists who will suddenly be knocking on the 50-over door like Rohit Sharma has.

T20 cricket will put pressure on the 50-over formats if they realize there is a younger generation that can break through. What T20 will also do is what 50-over cricket has done to Test match cricket. People like Adam Gilchrist and a few others realized they could play the same way in 50-over cricket and Test cricket. T20 will show, Yuvraj Singh and a few others, that they can, if they want to, clear the boundary at any time. It is up to them to choose the time to hit the big sixes. More than any other consequence, I somehow think India might enjoy that the most. Nasser Hussain is a former England cricket captain.

INDIA TODAY OCTOBER 8, 2007