Sourav Chandidas Ganguly

You will not need too much of introduction about this man.He is called as the god of off side. You need to understand the bowler and his bowling to be a good batsman. You need to understand the batsman and his batting to be a good bowler. You need to understand the game of cricket to be a good captain!And Ganguly is a captain,the real captain. Though its not a formal way of writing an article when you quote a personal incident but I am forced to quote this incident;one of my 70+ year old relatives in 1999 on seeing Ganguly’s 183 innings against Sri Lanka said “indha chinna paiyan romba nanna aadrdhe !Ithaala dhaan India team  future la strong aaportho ennamo ! ” It means “this small kid plays well!Because of him India’s future may probably get better!  ”.And the most interesting part is, this was the last words from his mouth.He died the next morning in sleep out of heart attack.And his last words became true!

                            Ganguly is a great captain and probably the greatest captain India had. And many will not decline if you say him as the third greatest Indian batsman of all time. The Bengal tiger made his one day international debut in the year 1992.Still he managed to become a regular player of the Indian team only after 1996 test debut in which he scored a century. From then on he started creating huge impacts with batting. 1997 to 2002 was his career peak and through out that period he was considered as the best oneday batsman on earth even ahead of Sachin Tendulakar.He became the third batsman in history to score a century in each of his first 2 test  innings. In oneday internationals he topped  the calendar year 1999 with 1767 runs with an average of 46, which is the second highest ever runs acquired by a batsman in a calander year next to Sachin’s 1894 runs in the year 1998 and 6 runs ahead of Dravid’s 1761 which he scored in the same year of 1999.His ODI domination continued during the next year also as he again topped the calendar year 2000 scoring 1579 matches(7^th highest individual annual score ever) but this was a better year than 1999 as he scored so many in just 32 matches which is better than the previous year’s 41 matches, with a better average of 56 and 7 centuries in the year. But 1999 was not the first year for Ganguly to become the highest run getter of a calendar year; in 1997 itself he achieved that feat for the first time scoring 1338 runs. In 1998 when Tendulkar topped Ganguly stood second in the world. So he was the 1997’s highest run getter, 1998’s second highest,1999’s highest and 2000’s highest run getter!!From 1997 to 2000 he played 147 matches and scored 6012 runs with 16 centuries and 33 fiftys.This 4 year achievement of Ganguly looks like  career figures of some top class batsmen of his period like Andy Flower isn’t it?  Is there any doubt why he was called as the best ODI batsman during that period? Was Wisden wrong in rating him as the 6^th best ODI batsman of all time?

                                He managed to score 11,363 runs(5^th highest overall till date) in one day international format with 22 centuries . He was not a great test player any way. Better to say that he was not so good like onedays. His test performances are not of a legend’s standards.He managed to score his only double ton towards the end of his career.Still he is a legend for the things he did not only as a batsman but also as a bowler who has taken 100 oneday wickets with 5/16 as his best figures; Not only as a bowler but also as a fielder who has taken 100 catches!;last but not the least,not only as a fielder but also as a captain!He is the one who totally changed India’s approach of playing from a coward’s approach to a tiger’s approach. Indians always feared playing big teams in 90s which even Sanjay Manjrekar, a former member of Indian team during 90s agreed with. Ganguly as captain changes everything. He captained India to win 21 tests which is the best record by any Indian captain! He has won 76 odis as a captain. He has a major role in India’s 2011 world cup victory though he retired 2 years earlier as he was the key reason for the formation of strong and fighting Indian team!