Ratra's success proves the value of persevering with talent

In these days of instant food, instant coffee and instant communication, it is tempting to look for instant results. Towards achieving this objective, old-fashioned virtues of patience and forbearance, tolerance and reasoning are sometimes given the go by. Unfortunately, instant results are not always possible. Some things take time to mature and grow in the traditional manner. The same is true in sport. It is not every cricketer who scores a century or has a match haul of ten wickets in his first Test. Even a prodigiously gifted player like Sachin Tendulkar got his first Test hundred in only his ninth match.

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I am mentioning all this now keeping in mind the example of Ajay Ratra. The 20-year-old wicket-keeper from Haryana, according to reports, came very close to being dropped for the Antigua Test. Plainly put, I could not comprehend why such a move was even being contemplated. True, he had scored just 16 runs in four innings. But then he is a specialist wicket-keeper whose batting should be considered a bonus. And from all accounts, he had kept reasonably well at Port of Spain and Bridgetown.

It is about time we stopped this obsession with wicket-keeper batsmen. If there is an Engineer and Kirmani who can bat as well as he can keep, that's fine. But in the absence of such a player, it is always better to go in for a specialist `keeper rather than a sub standard stumper who can score a few runs. In the long run, the latter is a short-term policy from which the team will not benefit.

But then if Ratra came close to being dropped ­ though good sense finally prevailed among the team management ­ it is part of a larger malaise. The policy of hiring and firing rather indiscriminately is quite common in Indian cricket. Young players are hardly given adequate opportunities to prove their credentials.

This is best exemplified in the following statistic. Of the some 240 cricketers who have been given Test caps, an alarmingly high proportion of about 80 ­ roughly a third ­ have played in one or two matches. Australia, on the other hand, is known for giving its players a fair trial and this is borne out by figures. Of the nearly 400 cricketers who have represented the country in Tests since 1877, only about 80 ­ just about a fifth ­ have played in one or two matches. Certainly this benign and refreshing approach is one of the reasons why Australia enjoys the pre-eminent position in world cricket not only today but also in overall results of matches played since Test cricket was first played a century and a quarter ago.

My favourite stories about how perseverance by Australian selectors has yielded long-term results concern Arthur Morris, Richie Benaud and Alan Davidson. In his first 13 Tests, Benaud took just 23 wickets at enormous cost and did not even score a half-century. In his first 12 Tests, Davidson got only 16 wickets and hit one half-century. In Indian cricket, such results would have meant banishment from the Test arena. But aware that theirs was a case of potential far outweighing performance, the selectors ­ and team managements one must add ­ gave them every encouragement and this far sighted policy paid off rich dividends as the whole cricketing world knows.

Benaud became the first cricketer to achieve the double of 2000 runs and 200 wickets ­ besides being one of the outstanding captains in the game's history - while Davidson, one of the leading all-rounders of his time, finished with 186 wickets from 44 Tests at an average of 20.53.

Again, in the case of Morris, the scores in his first two Tests were 2 and 5. If he had been an Indian cricketer, that would have been the end of his Test career. Yet going by the adage `Form is temporary, class is permanent', the selectors picked him for the third Test. The left-hander ­ later to find a place in Don Bradman's dream team - repaid their confidence by scoring 155, the first of three centuries in successive Test innings and he remained Australia's No 1 opening batsman for the next decade.

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This roughshod policy in Indian cricket has been particularly rampant in the case of wicket-keepers. This at least was one slot in which there was more than a semblance of permanence in the Indian team, right from Engineer and Kunderan to Kirmani and More, from the 1960s to the 1990s.

In the last couple of years, the selectors have created more than a sense of just uncertainty in dealing with this crucial position. Once Nayan Mongia for reasons still unclear, went out of favour, the stumper's place has been filled ­ with no sense of permanency - by MSK Prasad, Samir Dighe, Vijay Dahiya, Saba Karim, Deep Dasgupta and Ajay Ratra. This kind of hiring and firing does no good in bolstering the morale of a team that is already beset by inherent weaknesses.

It is to be hoped that Ratra has now cemented his place in the side and the game of musical chairs for the stumper's slot is finally over. The selectors would also do well to learn by Ratra's example that a policy of hiring and firing will not yield dividends in the long run, that deserving cricketers should get a fair trial and that a discerning approach is what Indian cricket needs. It is ironical that it has taken Ratra a feat with the bat to consolidate his place behind the stumps. But then such ironies are a disturbing aspect of Indian cricket.