L'affaire Vinod Kambli

Prem Panicker

A day earlier, we had put up our own shortlist of the probables for the upcoming tour of the West Indies, and given reasons for our picks.

Today, I find the mailbox flooded with responses - and if there is one common thread running through the over 60 letters that have come in on the subject, it is "How come you forgot Vinod Kambli?"

The question would appear to be even more moot when you consider that on waking up and opening the newspapers this morning, the first thing I find is a report of Bombay's latest Group C match against Hyderabad.

For those who came in later, Hyderabad at the Gymkhana were all out in the first innings for 240, with Test prospect Abey Kuruvilla taking 3 for 35 off 18 overs and spearheading the Bombay bowling. In response, Bombay ended day two on 270 for three - a total made possible by a brilliant 111 off 144 balls, with 11 fours and five sixes. When Kambli came to the crease, the Bombay score was 33/2. When he left, it was 217 for three and of the 184 runs added for the fourth wicket, Kambli had contributed 111 while Amol Majumdar, who later went on to register his individual century (batting 104) in company of skipper Sanjay Manjrekar (batting 26) was pretty much content to play spectator.

Sure, domestic performances are no real yardstick with which to judge a batsman's international calibre. But then, the 24-year-old southpaw has, in course of 21 innings spread over 17 Tests, scored 1084 runs with a highest of 224 and a total of four Test hundreds besides three fifties, at an average of 54.2. And supplemented this with 2003 ODI runs, with two 100s and 11 50s and an average of 38.5 which, given that he comes in the middle order and rarely has time to build a long innings, is very good going indeed.

More, Kambli in his first two Tests came up with back to back double 100s, first against England, then against Zimbabwe. And though neither bowling attack was really up there with the best, it still needed Kambli to milk it to the maximum and, in the process, show an incredible appetite for runs that was to fetch him 793 runs in his first seven Tests at an average of 113.29.

Making out a pretty good case for the left-hander, aren't I? So why then did I not include him in the lineup for the West Indies?

The answer, in one word, is "attitude".

Kambli's first brush with notoriety came in 1992, when he made part of the Indian team for the World Cup co-hosted by Australia and New Zealand. India was to play Sri Lanka in the Australian town of McKay, but rain interfered. By way of keeping the spectators in good humour, a group of showgirls came out on the pitch and danced to piped music. And pretty soon, they were joined by the curly-headed Kambli, whose natural ebullience rebelled at the thought of sitting in the dressing room while there was fun to be had outside.

The photographers had a field day. And back home, the traditionalists raised their eyebrows at the sight of an Indian cricketer surrounded by a bevy of beauties, shaking a nifty leg when he should by rights have been in the team dressing room, sombre faced and staring out at the rain.

Frankly, I for one could find no fault with Kambli for that incident - who on earth dictated that cricketers shouldn't have fun? As long as a player remains one hundred per cent committed on the field, it shouldn't matter what he does outside it, unless by his doings he brings disrepute to the team and the country he represents. And there was definitely nothing disreputable in Kambli's dancing with a group of girls and keeping the spectators entertained.

However, when we make allowances for Kambli, it is with one proviso - that he does not do anything to bring himself or the team to disrepute. And it is that proviso he went against four years later, during the Wills World Cup on Indian soil.

Prior to the World Cup, Kambli had married his long-time sweetheart - but the path of young love did not, apparently, run too smooth at the time. The result - public squabbles between husband and wife in the lobby of the hotel where the Indian team was staying, numerous instances of Kambli going out alone in the evening, getting drunk, then returning to the hotel to bang on room doors, disturb his team-mates and indulge in behaviour that was by any yardstick unacceptable.

Even with all this going against him, Kambli did have a fine run in the Wills World Cup, his flat out assault against the West Indian quicks Ambrose and Walsh in the league match at Gwalior being particularly outstanding. And the most enduring memory of that tournament was the sight of Kambli, sobbing bitterly as he returned to the pavilion after match referee Clive Lloyd had conceeded the semifinal to Sri Lanka following incidents of stone throwing at the Eden Gardens in Calcutta.

Those tears were the mirror images of the ones he shed when, during the earlier tour of Sri Lanka, he took on the Lankan spinners on their home turf to slam two good centuries. On the second occasion, in the second innings of the second Test, he was given out off a dubious decision and again left the ground in tears.

Reactions, both, of a batsman who hates nothing more than to be deprived of an opportunity to fight the good fight. India may have been totally out of it in the World Cup semifinal - but Kambli grieved, publicly, over the fact that he had been denied the chance to go down fighting.

An exemplary attitude, that - but not enough to convince the team management to go with him for the tours of Singapore, Sharjah, Sri Lanka, Canada (versus Pakistan) et al. And if his dropping seemed harsh, then everyone who was closely involved with the Indian team during the World Cup will concede that his behaviour warranted no less.

Kambli himself was to admit as much, in private conversation. And to go on to say that he had thought long and hard about his failings, that he desired nothing more out of life than to get back into the Indian side and erase the blot on his record, and that he would do whatever he had to, to achieve that goal.

How did he plan to make a comeback? "I have worked on my attitude problems, and can assure you that those days are gone. Now I just have to get on with it and make runs everytime I go out to bat," Kambli said then.

And it seemed that Kambli was on the road to living up to that - the drinking bouts were a thing of the past, and the runs began coming again by the ton, no pun intended.

And just when the pundits began asking why Kambli had not been sent to South Africa, at least for the one-dayers, the enigmatic player messed up the copybook again. Despite repeated intimations, he failed to turn up for the practise sessions of the Bombay Ranji team, and as a result found himself axed by the Mumbai Cricket Association selection committee headed by Dilip Sardesai.

The grounds? Indiscipline.

At a private function recently, team captain Sanjay Manjrekar was asked whether he had any idea what Kambli's problem was. "I wish I knew," Manjrekar said then. "We've gone out of our way to help him out, it has even been suggested that if he has a problem coming over from Pune (a train commute of three hours) to Bombay for practise, then he begin playing for the Maharashtra team instead. Thus far, nothing has worked."

And that is the reason why Kambli continues to find himself out in the cold - for no team, especially one trying to get back on a winning track, can afford such behaviour.

Meanwhile, what does Kambli think of his own prospects? "It may sound odd, as I have been saying this over and over again, but I am really trying to put my cricketing career back on the rails," Kambli said just before the ongoing Group C game wherein he blazed that 100. "Things keep happening, but I am sure that again, I will make a case for myself by getting runs in every game."

With Saurav Ganguly, another left-hander, cementing a place in the Indian eleven, how does he rate his own chances? "Well, this is something I can't answer. It is not a question of replacing someone else, merely one of deserving a place in the side - and the way I will deserve my place is by getting runs."

A minus against Kambli has been that his pronounced shuffle and exaggerated pickup have made him vulnerable to genuine quick bowlers concentrating on a line on and outside off stump. "Technique alone never gets runs," Kambli responds. "There are also other factors, such as determination and temperament. And thanks to having spent some time with Mr Gavaskar and having made some adjustments to my technique, I am now confident I can get runs against fast bowlers. I no longer let my bat hang in the air before the ball is delivered, I have gone back to a more normal stance and as a result, my timing is also much better. Mr Wadekar has also helped me reorganise my technique," says the player whose big hitting against the likes of Ambrose, Walsh and Shane Warne is still talked of by awed fans.

But ultimately, attitude decides. And Kambli appears to have realised that, if this statement is any indication. "I know that I have disappointed my fans, and also people like Mr Gavaskar and Mr Wadekar and my friends in the Indian team. Mr Gavaskar was right when he said I rode my luck too far without working on my flaws. At that time, nothing went right for me on and off the field. But the scene is different now, I am determined to come back. I have worked on my flaws and am sure I can satisfy my team and my fans now.

"Frankly, I am not concentrating merely on the West Indies tour. I am now just 24 years old, age is on my side and I have a lot of cricket left in me. The only thing I need, now, is to get a break and for that, I plan to work very hard, and score as many runs as I can at every opportunity."

Vide the 111 against Hyderabad on Monday? "Yes," is the smiling response.

Team coach Balwinder Singh Sandhu is vocal in support of his star. "Kambli is fine now, he has apologised for missing nets earlier and the association is happy with his statement, which it has accepted while reinstating him in the team," says Sandhu, the man who set India on the path of its most famous international win by bowling Gordon Greenidge with a huge inswinger in the 1983 World Cup final at Lords. "I am happy to report that he is now showing interest in the nets, and his attitude is just fine. I think he is too good a cricketer to be allowed to languish in the wilderness."

So there you have it, the case for and against. You - and the national selectors - be the judge...

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