Respecting Ganguly

Published : Dec 17, 2005 00:00 IST

Sir, — The piece on Sourav Ganguly by Rohit Brijnath (The Sportstar dated November 26) was quite interesting and a fitting tribute to the man — the most successful captain of Indian cricket team. I am a staunch supporter of Ganguly, but believe me even I was feeling embarrassed by the persistent poor form of the 'Prince of Kolkata'.

But much as I love the new man at the helm — the ever dependable, ever solid Rahul `The Wall' Dravid — we should not sink so low as to demean a fallen hero. Ganguly has, after all, done a lot for Indian cricket. It, therefore, gave me great pleasure to read Rohit's compassionate, balanced and brilliant profile of Dada. In fact, I liked it so much that I really could not hold back my tears.

Sourav may be out of form but he deserves a decent good bye. The local press may root for Ganguly ad nauseam but that should be no reason for others to rejoice over his misfortune. As a fitting tribute to a great cricketer that is Sourav Ganguly, let us pray for the proverbial phoenix like resurrection of the man who once spun a dream called `Team India.'

A. B. Samanta, Burdwan, West BengalTurning to technology

Sir, — In the recent India-South Africa series and in the just concluded series between Australia and West Indies Down Under, we saw quite a few ordinary LBW decisions that were given, much to the chagrin of the teams at the receiving end.

From the looks of it, the only solution to the deteriorating standard of umpiring in cricket would be to place even more faith in the accuracy of the TV umpire.

Many matches have been lost unjustly due to such umpiring errors in the past.

This is grossly unfair. Human errors should not be allowed to affect the outcome — especially when there is the guiding hand of technology to help us get it right.

K. A. S. Namboodripad, ThrissurSilent sensation

Sir, — It was a significant achievement by Inzamam-ul-Haq, who cracked centuries in both innings of the second Test and broke the great Javed Miandad's record of the highest number of hundreds in Test cricket by a Pakistani (23).

The achievement speaks volumes for the class and the calibre of a great player, whose commitment to Pakistani cricket can never be doubted.

Inzamam has been a model of consistency and has performed outstandingly as the linchpin of an notoriously inconsistent, often volatile but very gifted Pakistani batting line-up.

His quietly confident captaincy has contributed a lot to the rising fortunes of this evolving Pakistani cricket team.

The self-effacing star deserves to be celebrated — for he is not the kind of man to make a hue and cry about it.

D. Giridhar, ChennaiFinal frontier for Lara

Sir, — Brian Lara's career is consistently marked with great milestones. You name the record, and Lara has it. Who holds the record for the highest individual Test score? Brian Lara (400).

Who has the highest first class score in cricket? Once again, Brian Lara (501 not out). And who has the highest number of runs in Test cricket? Now, Lara that record too!

Needless to say, it takes a special kind of talent to scale the heights Brian Charles Lara has.

Hats off to the great man! We hope Lara's achievements will provide the much-needed inspiration to motivate the next generation of Caribbean cricketers and help them regain at least a smidgeon of their past glory. Or so we hope.

P. Krishna, Chennai

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