The Hindu : Sport : When losing becomes a habit

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Dec 01, 2006
ePaper

Sport

Sport

When losing becomes a habit

Can this Indian team ever go for the jugular, asks Nirmal Shekar

The U.S. comedian Groucho Marx once told a friend that he wanted to play cricket.

"Why?'' asked the surprised friend. "Because in cricket it doesn't seem to matter whether you win or lose,'' said Marx.

In a country where tens of millions nervously rip off fingernails and break into a sweat each time a Sehwag or a Tendulkar makes his way to the crease, it does indeed matter to us whether the Indian team wins or loses.

But, over the last few months, it has been difficult to subdue the suspicion that if Marx were alive today, he would find a few kindred spirits in the Indian cricket team. For, this is a team that has lost, and lost, and lost.

It's almost as if it is the only thing the Indian cricketers are capable of — losing.

About the only consolation is, it is never a matter of sameness. A sports team that a whole nation is obsessed with has been inventive enough to find a new way to lose each time, in the West Indies, in Malaysia and now in South Africa.

Yet, the heart-warming thing is, there are signs of progress. After losing the second ODI by more than 150 runs and the third by more than 100, the boys cut down on the losses a bit in the fourth, bringing the margin down to 80! Critics and expert commentators would surely point to a dozen things — or more — that are wrong with the team. Collective slump in batting from. Poor fielding. Tactical inadequacies.

All very well. But what of this? Perhaps losing has simply become a habit with this team, a habit that is very difficult to shake off, a habit that is reflected in their body language as much as a smoker's is in his fingertips and his teeth and an alcoholic's is in his breath.

In sport, at all levels, but particularly at the very top, a nightmarish side of losing is that it is contagious. Losing begets more losing. A team/individual can be on a roll both ways, up as well as down. And South Africa and India, at the moment, are classic contrasts.

Defeat, in itself, may not be such a dishonourable thing. After all, the true test of a man's character lies in how he deals with triumph and disaster. This is particularly so in the world of sport where success and failure materialise almost at once.

Different kinds

But there are two kinds of losses — honourable losses and dishonourable losses. It is an honourable loss when you fight and fail, but a shameful defeat when you cave in without a fight, when you fail to seize the opportunities that come your way, when you fail to do enough to realise your potential.

Can't this Indian team ever go for the jugular? Even when the enemy is disarmed and is sticking his neck out for the inevitable chop (South Africa on the ropes at six down for 76 in the third ODI) our boys turn the other way, quickly disarm themselves and surrender as a matter of habit.

All this, of course, brings us to the heart of the matter. In sport, as much as in life in general, losing is like a chronic illness. The best of antibiotics prescribed by the best of doctors seldom work.

And if the team/individual is not to be forever tainted as a loser, what it/he needs is a dramatic change in attitude. Several years ago, Harry Hopman, arguably the greatest of all tennis gurus, told me that the only way to stop a losing streak is to pause, take a deep breath, and tell yourself you are not a loser.

Believers

"You've got to start believing that you are a winner. All the resources won't help if you lack this belief," Hopman said. "All great champions are believers. They start with the belief that they cannot be beaten." This belief is reflected in different ways. Some, like Pete Sampras and Rahul Dravid hide their killer instinct and unshakeable self-esteem behind gentlemen-exteriors. Others such as Jimmy Connors and Shane Warne are less modest.

"I hate to lose more than I like to win. I hate to see the happiness on their faces when they beat me," said Connors, back in the 1970s.

Not all winners may have discovered a similar hatred in themselves but, more often than not, they are fuelled by a powerful urge for victory and when they lose they feel the hurt much more than lesser mortals.

This, of course, begs the question: Is this Indian team feeling the hurt strongly enough after a loss? You begin to think they aren't, for if they did hurt enough — and with the talent available — it should have been possible to turn things around.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Sport