Destiny's child

Six years ago the Natwest Trophy win and the coming of age of Mohammad Kaif sent Indian supporters into flights of frenzy. Swap Robin Uthappa with Kaif and a similar script beckons us.

Hush! Sages often warn. At times the mood in India - as Nawab Pataudi would say - could be "one of dangerous self-deception." We Indians create heroes only to pull them down (Read Uthappa 2007, and Kaif post-2002). Let's hope Uthappa enjoys a career that his country will be proud of. Only time will tell.

As I saw Robin's eyes snapping with eerie ideas, trying to fashion an improbable win, I recalled our telephone conversations when he was out of the side. A great believer in destiny, he knew that he would be back in the reckoning.

Somewhere within, Robin was aware that mere hundreds would not suffice. He had to do something different, play with such flair that 'the men who matter' would find him irresistible. He started to get the tall scores but had enlarged upon his game a rare, imposing quality. If I am not mistaken, some of his Ranji Trophy hundreds came in the first session of play.

Those who witnessed some of those innings believe that he can swear by power, alter himself into a beast when required. But cricket, many a times, presents situations that call for the subtle dynamics of batsman-ship. And at the Oval, Robin brought some method to the savagery. Perhaps, even more significantly he thought like a batsman.

While the more-experienced Mahendra Singh Dhoni was struggling to dig out the yorkers, Uthappa brought his mind into play as he shuffled in and out, walked a couple of steps to unsettle the bowlers and scooped the full-length balls to deep fine leg. If you can think like that at 21, you have a future.

I hope this boy is not left alone to perish in hibernation. Give him the leeway to express himself without the baggage of method, grant him some allowance for failures, temper him delicately when he short-sells himself but make him feel that he belongs. Robin, too, would have realised what it means to be in a happy dressing room, a winning dressing room.

In a certain interview, when the chairman of selectors Dilip Vengsarkar was asked why some of the youngsters weren't getting a look in, he answered: "Youngsters have to be groomed at the international level and not rushed in. You can't throw them into the deep sea and expect them to swim. Besides they must be groomed in the winning environment which is very important. That's the reason youngsters in the Australian teams and Mumbai teams in India develop the winning habit."

Couldn't but agree. When Uthappa returns home he will tell Karnataka's budding cricketers all about a team-man's hug, why the struggle and brickbats are worth it, how it stirs the soul to see the tricolour flying, and why breakaway leagues pale in comparison to such delights.

He would have seen the way Sourav Ganguly, the lodestar of aerial route, gave a fitting riposte to Stuart Broad as if to suggest: You have a long way to go, baby. Robin may have told himself: "This is what you play for. It is not always the money but the innate desire to cross swords at the highest level."

Uthappa's next challenge will be to make an impact in the Test arena. He has still some work to do on this count: tighten his technique without inhibiting his style. Along the way he will stumble on the occasional pitfalls and run into unreasonable cricket extremists. We pray that amid all this he continues to find the runs. And with it some balance.