‘When Yuvi was sixteen, he was practising at the nets and Navjot Sidhu, captain of the Punjab Ranji team, saw him. He told me to include him in the Ranji team. Raj Singh Dungarpur said to me, “Ahh, a champion is here!” I said, “No, he is not ready yet.” He said, “What are you talking about?” I said, “Sir, when he is ready, you’ll know.”
‘Yuvi played his first Ranji Trophy match against Orissa and got out for a duck. For two and a half years after that, he didn’t play Ranji. I think that Ranji match was a big mistake. An emotional decision made by Sidhu. Maybe he wanted to prove something to me or to Yuvi. Maybe he thought Yuvi had the potential to be a great player and he needed an opportunity. But I honestly felt that was a wrong decision.
‘At the age of sixteen, Yuvi was concentrating on batting, lofting and hitting the ball cleanly. There were still a few things that had to be rectified. Also, there was the issue of fitness. It is different when you are playing U-14, U-16 and then U-19. When you are selected to play Ranji, you have to be ready for it. And I believe that you know you are ready when you are confident of handling pressure.
‘By the time he was chosen for the U-19 World Cup team, Shabnam and I had separated. But Yuvi was with me during the U-19 World Cup and even during the ICC tournament in Nairobi. Soon after that, things started going wrong within the family. Yuvi left me. My mother had died. There was no one to hold him, no one to tell him to sleep at ten and wake up at five. He was treated like a star by his mother – mothers just can’t be strict. And the limelight was on him at a very young age. It was very difficult for him to handle.
‘I have my values. I am a man who loves and needs love. I cannot be pushed around by my wife, parents, son or anybody. Today Yuvi must realize that he has not done any good to himself by not coming to me. Whenever he did come to me in the past and wanted to have practice sessions, he enjoyed it. I made everything that he needed for good practice available to him.
‘Perhaps his mother must have told him something about me, what I did when he was a child. And they must have struck a chord in his mind because they reminded him of how I had treated him during his making. Gradually we drifted apart. I felt bad, for I am the sort of person who would abandon the world for someone who came to me with love. But if someone walks away from me, or takes me for granted, I won’t be there for them, regardless of who they are.
‘Yuvi was born into such a great family, he could have done wonders by now if we hadn’t been separated. Shouldn’t he pity himself? For not being allowed to do what he is meant to be doing? Also, he should ask himself, has he been truthful to the game?
‘I want to speak the bitter truth now. If you want to prepare someone for their future, three things have to be stopped immediately. One is the interference of relatives. Second, there has to be very strict discipline, even from the mother and grandmother, or whoever is living in the house. And there has to be one man who should take charge. This is very important and Yuvi should have done it himself, but I don’t blame him because he thought what his father did with him was wrong. It wasn’t Yuvi’s fault at all. Everybody around him was saying the same thing.
‘When he was eighteen, I told the media that Yuvi was the next Sobers. People laughed at me. Many ridiculed me. After those six sixes he hit in one over off Broad, the media wrote the same and Sobers endorsed it.
‘I remember how it was when Yuvi made it to the U-19 World Cup team in 2000. To reach the U-19 took ten years and ten hours a day of preparation: batting, bowling and fielding. No television, no outings, no holidays. If he needed a friend, I was there. I was his friend, I was his mentor, I was his father, I was everything. Yes, I was ruthless, and you too, Makarand, used to get angry with me.
‘But fitness is the most important thing. Even the great Sir Garfleld Sobers once remarked to Bishen Singh Bedi that if he had known what fitness training was all about, he would have scored 50,000 runs!
‘For me, fitness training meant running twenty or thirty rounds every day, sprinting 400 metres, taking 500 catches, gymming, four sessions of batting, and bowling. It was a ten-hour job. I would make him do six hours on the ground and then come back home and work for four hours more. And Makarand, you were a witness to it. There were times when you too felt that I was overdoing it.
‘I think all this made Yuvi a better player. Also, he was the fittest. There was no one in the world except Jonty Rhodes who could match him as far as fielding was concerned.
‘The point is not that you practise the whole day. It is how perfectly you practise. Yuvi was a brilliant left-arm fast bowler, and then he developed a lower back problem. Otherwise, we would have seen him bowl at 145 km per hour. That is what preparation is all about.
‘If you want to get someone to be outstanding in this world, that is how you do it. You have to sacrifice so much. Your family, friends, everything. Only then will you achieve something in life. Look at Tiger Woods, Sunil Gavaskar, Sachin Tendulkar, Vivian Richards. Can we not learn from them?
‘I am very unhappy about the progress Yuvraj has made as a cricketer. He has lived up to only 25 per cent of his ability and talent. The only person who has done justice to his talent is the great Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar. That is why I salute him all the time. He has been doing it day in and day out for the past twenty-three years. He has sacrificed so much for the country.
‘Yuvi was not ready to listen to his father as far as cricket was concerned. He thought other people were better. Among the many things he has to learn is how to pace an innings. Don’t throw away your wicket, I used to tell him. Score 200 not out, or 300 not out. Once, he scored 365 in the U-19 final against Bihar. I said, “Well played, well done, but you could have got 400 runs.” His reply was, “Bacche ki jaan loge kya?” (Are you going to kill the boy now?). I said, “Don’t talk to me like that again.”
‘Yuvi has so much power, such perfect timing, so much talent. He sights the ball so early that there is no need for him to hit sixes all the time. I used to tell him, “If I had ten per cent of your talent, I would have scored 100 and 200 in every alternate innings.” Mahila Jayawardene and Kumara Sangakkara said this too.
‘I used to tell him not to sweep the ball at the start, one should first know when to sweep. He needs to understand that it’s not about deciding whether to play a stroke. It is knowing when and how to play a shot. “One has to visualize shot selection,” I would say to him. But he used to brush me off. I wish I had played a hundred Test matches. Then maybe he would have listened to me.
‘I have been taught by one of the best teachers in the cricketing circuit: Ashok Mankad. I think he is one of the greatest captains I played under, who took me from batting at number nine to opening the innings. It got me many hundreds. He always told me I didn’t know my capability and where I was going wrong.
‘Ashok Mankad made me practise my defence. Even today, if you want to succeed in Test cricket, you need to be a good defensive player. You must not throw your wicket away. It is not about hitting sixes and fours, it is about ones and twos and pacing your innings. Once, I remember, I got 136 runs against the Tatas and he shouted at me because I threw my wicket away.
‘Yuvi should have realized this too. He could have come to his father and said, “Dad, one week with you. I am going to go and play a Test match.” I would have said, “Son, defence is very important, I am going to throw five hundred balls to you. You just defend. Front foot forward and defend the ball.” But Yuvi was not prepared to listen to his father where cricket was concerned.
‘What Yuvraj Singh is today is not his fault, it is the fault of the environment he has lived in. What is the use of having a lavish life, with cars and bungalows and money, if you are not doing the right things?
‘He got carried away by the publicity and the glamour. He started playing to the gallery and not for himself. Yuvi became a superstar when they began to tell him, “Oh, you can hit a great six, you can hit it here or there!” There was a time when I used to tell him not to hit the ball be
cause it wasn’t possible to do so every time in international cricket. He would ask, “Then how do you get the runs?”
‘Viv Richards used to say, “I am an entertainment man. I am here to entertain people.” Fine, he could say that because he had achieved so much, he was the greatest. But if Yuvraj Singh starts saying that he is an entertainer, I am sorry, he has not reached that stage at all.
‘I could compare Yuvi to Vinod Kambli. Such a great player. What happened to him? All the former Mumbai cricketers are responsible for what happened to Kambli. Nobody took him in hand, nobody mentored him.
‘There were times when I used to give Yuvi a call and say, “Son, do this, do that”, and he would say, “Yes, I’m doing it. I’m not a kid anymore”. I used to feel so stupid. I would tell myself, Yograj Singh, why are you running after him? But I was doing it to ensure that his talent didn’t go down the drain.
‘Yuvi seems to have forgotten that all this glory is because of the game, because of this beautiful game called cricket. He has taken life for granted. Does he ever ask himself, What have I given back to the game? Is it enough to just go out and play?
‘Because I was concerned about Yuvi’s attitude, I once rang his mother, and she said, “Who the hell are you? You are a divorcee. Leave us alone.” I talked to Yuvi, and the way he put me off, I felt deeply hurt.
‘I think Yuvi’s mother could have handled him better. He was only nineteen when he started playing international cricket. She seems to have pampered him. There was no one to question him. Does she ever stop him from going out, partying till late? Yuvi today doesn’t know where he is going because he is surrounded by sycophants.
‘Had I been there, I would have given him the stick. You may be a great player, but when you come home, you are a part of the family. You are Yuvraj Singh, you are not a star. I would have thrown him out of the house. Second, I would have got him married to a wonderful girl who would have looked after the family and him.
‘That’s the reason he walked out on his father.
‘Yuvi should have realized that he was born with a golden spoon. His dad gave him everything required to bring him to the highest level. He should have at least acknowledged that as far as cricket is concerned, he owes it to his father. Or he should have had the guts to tell his mother to let me do it my way. Things would have been very different. Even today, after his cancer, if he comes back and spends the rest of his life with me, I am sure you will see a different Yuvraj Singh because I can make things happen. I am a very, very disciplined and dedicated man.’
As he himself has often said, Yograj Singh never cared for or valued the opinion of others. Some call it confidence and some arrogance.
Yes, Yograj Singh has been extremely ruthless and unsympathetic and quite blind to his son’s pain in the pursuit of his goal. I wonder, though: Isn’t there a bit of Yograj in all of us? A father who desperately wants his son to follow his path. A father who wants to save his son from all the follies and mistakes that he himself committed.
Perhaps the only difference between an ordinary parent and Yograj is the extent of his determination. Behind the harsh taskmaster is the vulnerable heart of a father who cannot bear the thought of his talented son getting lost in obscurity. He preferred being hated for something worthwhile than being loved for nothing. He had to assume this role for the future of his son, in the hope that someday his son would come to him and say, ‘Thank you, Dad, for making me’.
Yograj’s vision has come true. Yuvraj Singh has made it and made it big. As for the father, his vision may have come true, but his dream still waits.
Chapter Six
SPEAKING OF TECHNIQUE
They say politicians never retire, they only fade away. This is true of cricketers too. Many try to continue their association with the game in some way or the other after retirement, but only a few have succeeded.
Most players do not think about or plan for their retirement when they are still playing top-level cricket, especially if they have been doing so for almost two decades. Sometimes a cricketer is forced to take a long break for health or injury reasons and it takes a tremendous effort to get back into form.
In Yuvi’s case, it’s not an ordinary injury or minor ailment that he has had to fight. Can he do it? Can he come back to play for India and compete with the best in the world? Certainly, no one is doubting his ability to fight the odds or the depth of his burning desire to return to the Indian team. So what will it take for Yuvi to make a signifcant comeback?
Cricket, like most sports, is played and won – or lost – in the mind. It takes a steadfast mind to handle the pressure, specially at the top level. That Yuvi never had any trouble handling pressure while he was fit is evident. But after such a long lay-off and treatment, he will have to iron out a few technical flaws in order to perform well in international cricket.
Former India captain Dilip Vengsarkar, a veteran of 116 Tests, has seen Yuvi play since he was sixteen. He says, ‘Test cricket is different from any other format of the game. It’s much tougher, and mentally and physically draining. Even the bowlers look to enhance their ratings and perform at their best. They make the batsman work hard for his runs by bowling accurately and giving nothing away. In ODIs, however, both bowlers and fielders are on the defensive, so it’s easier for the batsman to play his shots.’
Vengsarkar should know. He was a naturally aggressive batsman who, as a teenager, hit E.A.S. Prasanna and Bishan Bedi, two of India’s top spinners, for seven towering sixes in a match between Rest of India and Bombay at Nagpur. But even he found it difficult to attack the bowling all the time, especially in first-class cricket. Polly Umrigar, a former India captain, advised Vengsarkar to spend more time in the middle if he wanted to succeed at the Test level. Vengsarkar immediately changed his approach and cut down on the lofted shots. He concentrated on playing more in the ‘V’ and went on to score sixteen Test centuries.
When batsmen in the earlier era encountered bowlers who were accurate, they preferred to be cautious. Mike Hendricks, the England fast bowler of the 1970s, was so confident of not bowling a single half volley that he once promised to buy a round of lager for his county colleagues if he ever bowled one! There were many like Hendricks, who were so accurate that it was difficult for batsmen to attack them. Today’s players, however, do not accept this strategy.
Yuvi, for instance, is essentially a front foot player. He is so good at driving the ball through the off side that bowlers tempt him by bowling around the off stump. Sometimes the batsman is likely to misjudge the length and if he doesn’t know his off stump, he is in for trouble, as Yuvi has found out far too often.
Analysing the technical aspects of Yuvi’s game, Saad Bin Jung, nephew of Tiger Pataudi and a former Hyderabad opener who, at the age of seventeen, scored a scintillating hundred for South Zone in 1978 against the likes of Malcolm Marshall and Vanburn Holder without wearing a helmet, says, ‘Yuvi has great hand-eye coordination and today he is the greatest batsman that we have. On his day many of us rate his talent as high as any other Indian player’s, if not higher, though he is different from our other greats in one unique way. He is tall and strong and has the gift of exceptional timing and he fiexes his body more than any other when he bats, using more muscle and whip than a normal batsman would. This on a good day gives him an edge over the greatest of them all and on his off day makes him more ordinary than the average. That’s why the inconsistency in his batting performance. The advantage with having Yuvi in the side is that even before he goes in to bat, say in a T20 game, he is at least 20 runs plus, these being runs saved by his brilliance in the field, and when he fails with the bat he makes up for it with the ball.
‘Yuvi bats with an unduly high back lift and though this is where he gets his strength from, it’s also his Achilles’ heel. In order to keep the ball down, a batsman with a shorter back lift is pushed hard when he has to play the square cut and hook as he is forced to take the bat above the ball in order to keep the ball dow
n. A high back lift overcomes this deficiency with ease and that’s why you will find that batsmen like Yuvi with a higher back lift are much better while playing square off the wicket. At any given time, his bat is looking down on the ball and this opens up the entire field for him. Though the high back lift helps him deliver greater impetus, it tends to lead to a looser game. Because of the extra distance the bat has to travel to meet the normal good length ball, the batsman needs to commit himself that fraction of a second earlier than usual. This can become a big disadvantage when he is playing truly quick bowling or genuine seam. Not only does he have to commit early but once committed, he finds it very difficult to change his shot as the momentum at the downswing of the bat is greater than that of a normal batsman. Further, as the bat has to perform a larger arc, even the slightest error in the downswing is greatly enhanced by the time the bat meets the ball, resulting in the risk of the bat coming across the ball. When this happens, it appears that Yuvi is playing a loose shot although in reality he is only doing what he knows best: playing cricket the only way he knows how to, sometimes like a genius and sometimes like any of us.’
Saad adds, ‘Most times, good seam bowlers on average tracks get murdered by him but if the wicket assists seam, then the intelligent bowlers exploit this disadvantage. A batsman who is technically challenged has to be really good with his timing. On his day, when he is moving well, he is a treat to watch. If you watch the footage of Viv Richards playing and analyse how he batted, you can see that he controlled and varied his back lift to meet that particular shot. His genius lay in optimizing his back lift, yet generating the amazing power that he did. That’s why Richards was so consistent. Complete control at all times is the hallmark of all great players. To me, Yuvi on his day is as great a player as Viv Richards.’
Yuvi Page 6
