India’s big three failed once again in the first innings of the 2nd test against Sri Lanka, the big three (Sachin, Ganguly and Dravid) in the three innings have a combined score of 97, their recent form and performance in the Srilanka series is indicating that these stars are fading and they are a mere shadow of their illustrious past, which raises the question should India bid fare well to these fading stars and show more faith and invest in their emerging players? The answer to the above question is a simple “yes” but the implementation of this simple answer is not so simple, the iconic stars in Subcontinent are not renowned for their honorable transition into retirement mostly their exit is bitter and embarrassing and they have to be shown the door by the selectors.
The selectors in Subcontinent are often confused in choosing between fading experienced stars and talented but inexperienced emerging players the answer is again simple but gets more complicated due to the huge fan following of the iconic players, if the emerging player fails the selectors come under fire from all corners as a result they always play it safe by voting in favor of the fading stars. In subcontinent people worship these stars like gods and often have unrealistic expectations from these stars they keep on hoping for one more performance reminiscent the past, it’s not that these players can’t play cricket anymore, yes they still can deliver occasionally whenever they will get favorable conditions but the consistency is not there.
I bet if Warne, Gilchrist and McGrath were Indian or Pakistani they still would have been playing for these countries, their performances in IPL were far better than some of the iconic players from the Subcontinent, the Australian team is still struggling as the replacements of these legendary players are taking their normal time to settle in International cricket but their transition in International cricket is far smoother than any emerging player from Subcontinent who often have to compete unnecessarily for years against these fading stars as a result they are often in and out of the team. These fading stars at the twilight of their career turn into shooting stars and some of them take some other bright stars with them into oblivion.
Do you think it’s time for India to let go of these fading stars?
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