"Great men need to be lifted upon the shoulders of the whole world, in order to conceive their great ideas or perform their great deeds. That is, there must be an atmosphere of greatness round about them. A hero cannot be a hero unless in an heroic world. " -
Nathaniel HawthorneAs an avid lover of cricket, i cant find anythin better to describe one of cricket's greatest entertainers... Adam Craig Gilchrist.. known to his close pals as gilly.... a player who had the world on the edge of their seats with those rasping square cuts and short arm pulls... alleged for cheating cos he used a squash ball in his gloves.. that helped him bring him back to the top... back where he deserved to be.... and respected for walking on his own...
When i woke up today morn n switched on the tv.. the score was 32/1 and the first thing that went through my mind was.. hope hayden's out.. (not that i dont admire hayden, but then that guy needs to get out once in a while...) and gilchrist's still battin.... it wasnt the usual fireworks but yet there was a message in it... a message for all those who loved him.. that he wasnt quittin.... he had his share and it was now someone else's turn at it....
There would be two groups of people who'd be pleased to see gilly, the batsman quit... bowlers around the world who have had the ignominy of their spells destroyed by him.... (in crickettin slang... "taken to the cleaners").. the second involves some elite people... who have the power to make mistakes... especially when the canaries are havin a swing... cos every single time Gilchrist nicks one.. he just turns and walks.. as if he gives a damn what the man-in-white thought about it... this is what wiki had to say about it :D, "Gilchrist is renowned for
walking when he considers himself to be
out, sometimes contrary to the decision of the
umpire"
i guess that should be the motto of every batsman... rather than calling themselves bein lucky for havin survived.. for ultimately no one cares which side won... the game always wins...
for a man who holds the most number of dismissals by a wicketkeeper in both forms of the game..... humility is an understatement to describe... cos when he said that he thought he didnt have in him anymore when he dropped laxman durin the test series...... i was bowled over..
Many others would have rubbed it off as a bad day and gone on to represent their teams for another 2-3 years.. (for sub-continent players that'd be 5-6 years...) which showed the ultimate pride for a cricketer... or for that matter, any sportsperson .. should be representing their country as long as they are worthy of it.... take leave when things are at a high note.... cos then a couple of years later looking back would be worth the effort...
finally, the author feels that the claims that haddin is the best wicky-bat in Australliaa... (thats how they say it.. ) is crap.. cos haddin wouldn never even be worth an out-of-form gilly... Its sad to see that he never got a chance to captain his side.. a team that has seen only 4captains in the past decade and a half... (asian teams pls note.. "a decade" is 10 years and not 10 months)... Probably they couldnt have seen their national team represented by a person without integrity (no offense meant.. thats what i've understood of the word the way its being used..)... "A hero's greatest act is to lay down his sword."...
