The deadly dilemma of being V.V.S. Laxman

BELIEVE IT or not, `Ripley' Jacobs no longer needed to let his left hand know what his right hand was doing as stumped, for an answer to the West Indies' 290, looked Sourav's India, upon its topnotch order's having failed to take up the gauntlet (58 for 3) in last Saturday's Harare decider. India's third wicket to fall at 58 (Coca-Cola Cup-clinchingly for the Windies) was V.V.S. Laxman - 18 off 22 balls. This touch-and-go artist's early departure only served to underline how much Rahul Dravid (30 off 32 balls) had done to rejuvenate his batting since yielding pricking pride of batting place to the Hyderabad high-flyer. Young Reetinder Singh Sodhi (67 off 75 balls: 3 sixes, 3 fours) and not-so-young Sameer Dighe (94 not out off 96 balls: 2 sixes, 7 fours) might have struck some valiant blows to help India finish just 17 short of that 291 target.

But, in the `final triangular' analysis, No. 3 Laxman's failure to deliver (after lasting a fair while on his return to the Harare middle) proved conclusive. Maybe Laxman, now, found his style cramped by that enforced four-match lay-off. Yet this is the precise kind of hard-lines possibility (as I teleview it) that Laxman habitually fails to allow for when, considering the dimension of his talent, he just refuses to seize chances when they come his way. And it is not as though Laxman was not Zimbabwe-forewarned by Steve Waugh, as that prescient Aussie wrote in his `Skipperspeak' column: ``Of course Tendulkar will score runs, and plenty of them, as will Dravid. But the big interest will revolve around Laxman. He is potentially as good as Tendulkar, but the seaming wickets will provide a stern challenge and give us a clue to his future prospects.''

Could Laxman, in all honesty, say that he made a genuine attempt to adjust his style and technique to the ``seaming'' wickets in Zimbabwe? To Bulawayo Laxman went having made his considerable reputation in Tests against the sternest Aussie challenge at home. That Laxman finger injury, in Zimbabwe, came later. For by that centrestage, shooting from the hip, VVS had already cast away his wicket four times in the two Tests. Laxman's 28 and 38 in the Bulawayo Test underscored that the will to stay did not match the skill to slay. His 15 and 20 in the Harare Test to follow raised serious doubts, all over again, about Laxman's temperament for the big occasion.

This when we legitimately thought that the February-March 2001 Test series in this country had settled, for all time to come, Laxman's resource and resilience to score runs at a match-winning pace for India in the international arena. Steve Waugh had the wit to point out that we had to wait and watch - in Zimbabwe. Steve's contention was in context, if only because the vital thing Laxman still tends to overlook is that each series (especially abroad) constitutes a different mindset-game altogether. Take, for instance, the 20 that Laxman slammed to start India's accordion-style fold-up in the Harare Test - for Zimbabwe, numbingly, to level the series 1-1. It was an extraordinary knock, considering that it was Laxman's fourth Test effort in Zimbabwe where the wickets, by then, he knew to be ``seamingly'' treacherous. This innings of 20 (coming upon his preceding on-tour Test scores of 28, 38 and 15) suggested that, like the Bourbons, Laxman had learnt nothing, forgotten nothing.

That 20 began with Laxman (in an ill-informed mishook) being all but caught overhead. If Laxman felt concerned about the great escape, he showed no signs of it in his `TVVS' demeanour. His tart retort in a vein hinting at success's having gone to his feet) was to bring off three loose- limbed fours in frenetic succession. Enough isn't enough for VVS, so he goes for yet another extravagant square-drive (immediately after), only to be dubiously caught by Brian Murphy, at point, off Trevis Friend. Any other batsman of Test seasoning would subtly venture to influence the umpire (Asoka de Silva) into referring the `lowdown,' on such a catch to the third eye. Not so our sportive Eden aristocrat. A confirmatory nod by the umpire's is signal enough for Laxman to walk - without in any way getting exercised in the matter. There is a certain finality about the umpires raised finger, I know. Yet there are ploys and ploys for a shrewd batsman to employ in an effort to plant the seed of self-doubt in the man making the dicey decision. But, then, shrewdness and VVS, never the twain can meet!

Laxman, by now, has watched Sachin long enough to divine how fiercely involved world cricket requires you to be to sustain your Sai- given success. ``Oh, but Laxman is not cast in the Sachin tele-mould,'' it will be contended. ``With VVS, to think is to strike!'' But V.V.S. Laxman is not Viv Richards - not yet - to be able, straightway, to hit through the line and get away with it. As one who, almost obsessively, insisted upon Laxman's India recall, VVS certainly made me feel fulfilled as, in the Eden and Chepauk Tests, he batted with a punchy authority that identified his neo-Harsha Online call number as 059-2816566. Even in such a heady moment, I drew impertinent attention to the fact that Laxman and Ambition were not necessarily made for each other - that we would have to bide our time to see if the mood abided when a fresh series got going.

The going could not have been Bulawayo better for Laxman as, both at 28 and 38, a hundred looked ridiculously easy within his rangy reach, given his repertoire and resilience. It appeared, in fact, just a matter of Laxman's turning `Reflections' into `Responses' in the idiom set by his Andhra father figure, A.S. Raman, who scored, as Editor of The Illustrated Weekly Of India,without ever sacrificing quality. That we had a Raman and a Laxman alike, pre- eminent in The Times Of IndiaBombay building, is what made Bharatan, there, a mere presence. But Rahul is no `mere presence' in the high-octane driving company of Laxman and Sachin now. By which I mean that the hour for Laxman to look out, yet again, is already at hand! It always is well for Laxman to remember that India's no. 3 spot does not stand seized for keeps from Rahul. In fact, Rahul is viewed to be already rebidding for that coveted slot, in the Indian eleven, even as skipper Sourav grapples with his personal problems and Laxman squanders Test opportunity after Test opportunity.

Just a timely reminder, here, to Laxman of the extenuating circumstances in which his Sydney Test 167; his Eden 59 and 281; his Chepauk 65 and 66 (followed by that one-day golden run of 45, 51, 83, 11 and 101) became the happenings they did. In the case of that much-replayed in the mind Tuesday, January 4, 2000, Sydney Test 198-ball 167 (from 258 for 8 with 27 fours and a five), do note that Laxman stood Ansett-discarded from Sachin- Kapil's team, touring Australia, in the very hour in which his vintage knock came. There was thus no Carlton & United Tomorrow, only an Ansett Today, for Laxman by then, so VVS just let himself go and it came off. Likewise, following that getback Wankhede Stadium Test vs Steve Waugh's Australia, Laxman yet again faced a now-or-never situation, in his career, as he could manage to raise scores of but 20 and 12.

That VVS went on to chisel 59 and 281 (452 balls, 631 minutes, 44 fours) is an Eden showing that endures as a TV eye-opener. Yet it is thematic to record that yet again, here, did Laxman turn up trumps only after having lived life on the edge (20 and 12) in that Mumbai Test. Next, his 65 and 66 at Chepauk (knocks still reverberating in the corridor of our memory) were, in truth, Laxman charismatically carrying on from where he had left off at Eden. This I say without taking anything away from the intrinsic merit of those 65-and-66 Chennai cameos. Likewise, Laxman's follow-up LOI scoreline (45, 51, 83, 11 and 101), wiping out the Odium of aggregating but 86 runs from 13 such matches for India), only fortified the conclusion that, when VVS is on a roll, the toll he takes of bowlers has to be viewed to be re-lived. Yet, once launched upon a fresh Test series, Laxman seemed to revert to his time-dishonoured mindless approach in the crucial matter of building upon his vast `Aussie' Test gains.

Aptitude has to be matched by Attitude - and this remains, for Laxman, a grey area in which the willowy virtuoso, in him, is found wanting time and again. Laxman's Zimbabwe finger injury could be pleaded as an alibi only up to a point. For this kind of a setback is always a possibility on tour. That is why Sunil Gavaskar eternally emphasises: ``Do it yourself while you are there, don't leave it to others!'' And Laxman had signally failed to seize Time by the forelock in the Bulawayo and Harare Tests. If his devil-may-care 20 in the Harare Test hurtled India to defeat, his 18 (on his return) in the Harare one-day play-off left Rahul (at 58 for 3) as India's sole senior survivor in targeting the West Indies' 290. What Laxman must never forget is that his immediate competitor still is Rahul (rather than Sachin), now that VVS, bursting at the `seams', has failed to address the Zimbabwean problem outlined by Steve Waugh. Observe how Sachin uplifted his game from the moment he sensed a silken rival in Laxman. So did Rahul set himself new international goals, once bent back to India no. 6.

Laxman alone remains the one to take slings as they come. Which is sad considering Laxman's enormous talent. Is Laxman then merely content to go along with Arthur Conan Doyle's submission, ``Talent instantly recognises genius'', vis-`-vis Sachin, seeing how he has let Rahul mount a combative counter-offensive? Steve Waugh has not been alone in expressing the view that Laxman commands the talent, ultimately, to take on Sachin.

A latent talent for how much longer, then, is VVS going to opt to be? Sri Lanka is almost Laxman's last port of classical call. Call the `spots' he here does only if he calls the shots with a discretion tempering the valour of being VVS. As one to the Laxmanner born, VVS has to resolve this, his deadly dilemma of mid-2001, here and now. Laxman's stroke production will be flayed so long as his stroke selection is flawed - as it was in Zimbabwe.

RAJU BHARATAN

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