The Myth of the Elegant Left-Hander!!

Inspired from Suresh Menon, Cricinfo

This is a very interesting topic, one me who is a staunch admirer of Left Handers, is forced to accept that the whole gaga about a left hander’s grace is a myth. I read this article “The myth of the elegant left hander” on Cricnfo, realizing how foolish I was to say that left-handers are more elegant than right handers. Maybe they are, but are the right handers any behind. Let’s find out.

As batsmen discover new strokes, new ways to get to the boundary (or into the stands), some of the old ones seem to have fallen off the charts, taking with them the words used to describe these. We no longer read of the elegant late cut or the stylish leg glance; instead we have the effective upper cut or the productive reverse sweep. It is not that grace has deserted the game and batsmen have put efficiency before charm, but in recent years a Michael Clarke has become the exception, a visually pleasing batsman incapable of playing an ugly stroke.

It’s astonishing to realize that there are innumerable right handed batsmen to name but none could be picked and compared over the last several years. Were they all living in the shadows of our ignorance? His prodigy, Sachin Tendulkar the master from Mumbai was never classified as elegant or graceful, but rather was compared to greats like Richards, Bradman and their stroke play. Are we as cricket lovers, fare enough to think that left handers are more graceful and elegant than the righties?...A Mark Waugh was in several ways more graceful than any average left hander. But then, why this perception of lefties being more elegant and classy, let us dig a little deeper.

If you are a left-hander, it is automatically assumed that you are graceful, artistic, and delicate and all those wonderful things that romantics like to burden cricket with. This is one of the game's most common myths - that left-handedness is by itself the reason for grace and elegance.

According to statics, around 10% of the population and perhaps 20% of top sportsmen are left-handed. The stats make the point that left-handers have the advantage in asymmetric sports like baseball, where the right-handed batter has to run anti-clockwise towards first base after swinging and facing to his left.

It is the comparative rarity of the left-hander that gives the illusion of grace. David Gower most graceful of batsmen used that very word, "illusion", to describe the left-hander's apparent grace.

"The fact is," he once told an interviewer, "both (the right-handers and the left-handers) have been horribly misnamed because the left-hander is really a right-hander and the right-hander is really a left-hander, if you work out which hand is doing most of the work. So from my point of view, my right arm is my strongest and therefore it's the right hand, right eye and generally the right side which is doing all the work. So if there is anything about this, then the left-handers, as such, should be called right-handers."

"It's the top hand which is doing all the work. It appears there's an illusion about this aspect too... they talk about left-handers having grace. Not all of them do. Though Allan Border was a wonderful player, he was short on grace."

What a mindful thought to actually make the cricket lovers realize that lefties are indeed righties and vice versa. When it comes to cricket this is more than true.

Graeme Pollock from South Africa, many years ago, explained that he played tennis right-handed, but golf left-handed (he signed an autograph with his right hand). Garry Sobers, on the other hand, was left-handed in everything he did. I don't know what conclusions can be drawn from this. Perhaps the left-hander whose right hand is the stronger hand plays the top-hand shots like the drive better than most. And the one with the stronger left as bottom hand plays the shots square of the wicket, the cut and pull, better. And since there is no more beautiful stroke in the game than the cover-drive, left-handers who play this well look most attractive.

Four of the five highest individual scores in Tests have been made by left-handers, two by Brian Lara who was thrilling to watch, though not quite pleasing in the Gower sense. But even if we include him among graceful left-handers since Woolley, the list is still rather limited: Pollock, Sobers, Gower, Lara, perhaps Alvin Kallicharran, who, if he had played tennis, would have been known as a touch player. India's Salim Durani batted with an apparent lack of effort - an important ingredient of elegance - and Sourav Ganguly has been described as having a lazy elegance, but again, these players were not in the Gower class.

But look at the left-handers, some of them great players, who were and are innocent of elegance - Border, Matthew Hayden, Clive Lloyd, Arjuna Ranatunga, Kumar Sangakkara, Chris Gayle, Sanath Jayasuriya, Justin Langer, Graeme Smith, Mark Taylor, Gary Kirsten, Bill Lawry, Marcus Trescothick, Aamer Sohail, Lance Klusener.

Left-handers play shots that right-handers do not play quite as easily, because more left-handers play right-arm medium-pacers bowling across their bodies from round the wicket than right-handers play left-arm bowlers. The not-quite-glance, not-really-a-hook that left-handers play fine off their hips is unique to them. Both Gower and Lara played it exceptionally well.

Ganguly didn't - but then he was a converted left-hander, someone who began that way so he could use his left-handed older brother's equipment. Sadiq Mohammad was a converted left-hander, whose older brother Hanif understood that as a left-hander Sadiq had a better chance of getting picked.

Too much has been made of the left-hander, and his alleged grace. A Gower was graceful because he was graceful, not because he was a left-hander. A Javed Miandad lacked grace not because he was a right-hander but because that was how he batted. One doesn't automatically presuppose the other.

Annoying Allegories to a True Legend...

“Consensus is that Sir Donald Bradman was the best batsman ever to play Cricket. Sir Don did not play One-Day Cricket but if he did, he could easily be Sachin Tendulkar.” – Barry Richards.

So, when this great man named Sachin Tendulkar was going through a lean patch in 2006, people all over the world starting counting his days at the international arena. But very few were to expect the kind of resilience and temperament he showed in the year to come. He was to show his critics and people who wanted to see him leave the dressing room, the true genius and magic of a diligent and committed cricketer. The year 2007 saw this great man amass yet another 1000 runs in a calendar year, making it 7 in total, and to show the world how India can reverse back after a dismal display at the World Cup.

Though I have been a great fan of this man ever since my learning days, the reason for me to pen my appreciation on his genius today is to make all those critics and boy lovers realize, that there is still that one name that draws attention in most opposition minds and makes them wonder – how on earth can we get this guy out!. Today when the over rated and over respected Mathew Hayden is on the verge of ending his test career, a 35 year old ‘kid’ is still wanting to win the WC for India, isn’t it a disgrace to have compared him to the genius of Sachin. Hayden does hold his aura at the top of the innings, but can it draw a comparison with that of Sachin, with a billion fans expecting a hundred every time he walks onto the ground and the entire dressing room looking up to him, I would say a big NO.

So, why the fuss about his selection before a tour begins, why an eye brow raise after every single digit score? Isn’t he human? Doesn’t he deserve the credit that of Mathew Hayden who even after 21 innings without a 50 is given a chance by the so called Aussie way of ruling things?

When drawing a comparison one has to look at what is the weight of balance on both ends. In cricket’s point of view, the kind of opposition one faced. In batting, Sachin has reached a stage that others can only dream of. He has hammered every bowling opposition in the world - from Shane Warne (Aus.) to Saqlain Mushtaq (Pak.), and Waqar Younis (Pak.) to Allan Donald (RSA), from Curtley Ambrose (WI) to Danny Morrison (NZ) and in style. What has Hayden faced, where did he get most of runs and against what kind of attack. 30 Test centuries do look credible, but are they credible enough to draw a comparison to that of Sachins’. This requires an entire new post.

Sachin’s saga though, continues as the master-blaster made the highest runs in a single calendar year in ODIs in 1998, amassing 1894 in 34 games at an average of 65.31, including nine hundreds and seven fifties. Tendulkar broke his own world record of 1611 runs set in 1996. He also crossed 1000 runs in five other years 1994, 1997, 2000, 2003 and 2007. At Indore against Australia on March 31 2001, Tendulkar drove Shane Warne for a single to long-off and went down as the first man to scale the summit of 10,000 runs in ODIs. Sachin Tendulkar reached another milestone during the third day of the second Test against Zimbabwe at the Harare Sports Club when he struck Arnoldus Blignaut for his third boundary to move from 18 to 22, Tendulkar surpassed Dilip Vengsarkar's tally of 6868 runs to become India's second highest Test run getter. The highlight of the Queen's Park Oval at Port of Spain in Trinidad, 2002, test play had been Tendulkar scoring his 29th Test century to equal Sir Donald Bradman's record of Test hundreds. The young maestro had surpassed Gavaskar’s tally of 34 Test hundreds and now sits on 41 Test Hundreds.

“You might pitch a ball on the off stump and think you have bowled a good ball and he walks across and hits it for two behind midwicket. His bat looks so heavy but he just waves it around like it's a toothpick.” – Brett Lee, on Sachin Tendulkar’s batting

Now lets in brief dig into his start. In his schooldays Sachin joined the nets of Dronacharya Ramakant Acharekar. With his schoolmate Vinod Kambli of Shardashram he enjoyed his school level cricket. These two Shardashram batsmen added a mountain of 664 runs for the third wicket in a Harris Shield game in February 1988 at the Azad Maidan to create a new world partnership record for any wicket in any class of cricket. Kambli made 349 and skipper Tendulkar 326 as Shardashram hoisted a total of 748/2 before taking mercy on a wilting St. Xavier's High School attack. It was then that he was picked up by eyes of selectors of Mumbai Cricket team. Tendulkar made them proud with his unique debut in domestic cricket. He remains the only player to score a century on debut in all three domestic first class competitions: 100 not out in the Ranji Trophy (Bombay v Gujarat at Bombay 1988-89), 159 in the Duleep Trophy (West Zone v East Zone at Guwahati 1990-91) and 103 not out in the Irani Trophy (Rest of India v Delhi at Bombay, 1989-90). (Stats courtesy www.howstat.com)

The wonder boy made his international debut in ODIs and Tests at the age of 16 against traditional opponent Pakistan and the fiery pace of Wasim Akram and Waqar Younis. Tendulkar became the youngest batsman to score a Test half century when he made 59 against Pakistan at Faisalabad on November 24 1989. He also became the youngest man to score 1000 runs in Tests - at 19 years and 217 days - during his fourth Test century at Johannesburg in 1992/93.

When Tendulkar is on, there is no more regal sight in the cricketing world (except for bowlers…they get experience of the nightmare). The spectators at the stadium are on their feet cheering while all over the world, TV audiences are glued to the screen.

With such an aura and magic around him, a comparison to the likes of Hayden and Ponting are beyond my understanding. Hayden himself had this to say.

“His life seems to be a stillness in a frantic world... [When he goes out to bat], it is beyond chaos - it is a frantic appeal by a nation to one man. The people see him as a God... “–Mathew Hayden, on Sachin Tendulkar.

” I am a normal person who plays cricket. I am nothing more than that” – Sachin Tendulkar, on being told of above quote.

He is so much to learn from, not just as a cricketer but as a human being. So my sincere urge to stop all those comparisons to the likes of Haydens, Pontings, etc. They hold their own but nothing as compared to the great one. Beyond doubt, a living legend and a great title holder!!!