Without fear, Viru’s come into his own

Harsha Bhogle
Posted online: Mar 13, 2009 at 0948 hrs
It would be easy to image Virender Sehwag as a pirate, terrifying genteel passengers on a cruise liner with his weapons and his audacity. Picture the bandana, the cutlass coming down with the speed of a bat clobbering a ball past mid-on! Pity then that he has the look of a genial halwai from Chandni Chowk, chubby cheeks and an enduring tussle with his girth, enjoying his jalebis as much as he does serving them; never too far from a smile and, as we now know, from the odd wink as well!
New Zealand’s bowlers might think he is a bully, riding roughshod over them and trivialising their offerings. But he isn’t a bully either because all bullies are, inherently, cowards shying away when someone bigger comes along. Over the last eight years, Sehwag has taken on the quickest in demanding circumstances and sometimes he has won and sometimes he has lost. But he is willing to take on the bowlers and the conditions, not afraid to lose, and that is not a quality bullies possess!

There is a secret to his fearlessness, a trait that resides in all those who are happy to live with risk; or indeed risk as most of us perceive it. Sehwag is not afraid of getting out. It doesn’t mean he is lackadaisical or that batting is a reckless, momentary pursuit. It is just that his mind is free from the fear of defeat.

And as most of us would have seen in our own lives, the moment we contemplate defeat, we open our doors to it. I’m sure he is aware, like most of us are, that in the pursuit of success, failure is always a neighbour, a by-stander waiting to jump in. But the more we look sideways at this neighbour, the less we look ahead. Sehwag has this extraordinary ability to let failure jump in from time to time but not worry too much about it.

But then, he has always been like this. What explains this amazing burst, this transformation from a potentially great but terribly ordinary one-day batsman to one that bowlers around the world fear and who, in his last 20 games, averages 60 with a strike rate of 130? For years Sehwag was a huge under-achiever, averaging a mere 30 at the top of the order and possessed of a maddening urge to find the fielder at third man to a ball that was short and outside off stump. Now he hardly seems to get out there and surely it cannot be because bowlers have stopped bouncing it short and high outside his off stump? Is speed, or lack of it, the issue, or are bowlers indeed bowling fuller or is there a greater discretion in strokeplay?

My guess is that he now has a greater variety of shots, especially on the leg side. He always flicked the ball well off his pads but could be kept quiet by the ball that bounced into his rib cage. Now he seems to have a couple of shots for balls in that area. First, the trademark straight jab through mid-wicket, a shot achieved through his incredible bat speed. But more important, when it gets higher, he has started pulling the short ball. And anything that comes off the middle of the bat and achieves decent elevation goes out of the ground in New Zealand anyway!

I also suspect he is being given the space that every performer needs. Inherently, performers need to be happy souls; a trapeze artist worrying about his job will probably find the safety net. With Gambhir, Yuvraj and Raina batting well, Dhoni solid and reliable and Tendulkar still evergreen, Sehwag probably has the licence to play his brand of fearless cricket. And he seems to be carrying this freedom with a touch of gravity because it can be a thin line between bravery and recklessness. For Sehwag to find out how far his ability can take him, he must have the freedom to play in his style and this team, through its composition and attitude, is giving him this freedom.

And so Sehwag can embellish our game with his own brand of cricket; so different from the two greats of this era — Rahul Dravid and Sachin Tendulkar. Dravid is the kind who would study angles like a draftsman, work out the best ones to employ and then use his incredible work ethic to perfect them. Tendulkar, for all his genius, has never been independent of the field setting; either showing up gaps through his placement or creating them where he wants to by playing the ball elsewhere (see how he plays the paddle sweep which forces a fielder to be placed there and opens up a gap where he wants it to be opened).

But Sehwag looks upon the field placement as an independent event; something the opposition captain has to do but not anything he needs to worry about.

That is why it is a great game; because it has room for all kinds; and because it has room for Sehwag.