There is no denying the fact that every sports fan has the tendency to invariably compare an up-and-coming talent to a yesteryear legend. On similar lines, the young Prithvi Shaw was instantaneously compared to Virender Sehwag soon after he made his international debut. Shaw’s explosive nature of batting, his – lack of – footwork, and his stroke-making are quite similar to that of Nawab of Najafgarh and so, naturally, the uncanny similarity got fans excited.
However, it has taken only a handful of Tests for the admirers to criticize the youngsters, who after witnessing just a few failures in Adelaide is being termed an imposter who never really was the ‘next Sehwag’. In this time of turmoil for Prithvi Shaw, Sehwag’s former opening partner Aakash Chopra has arrived in his defense. Chopra, in his ESPNCricinfo column, condemned people labelling the young protege a ‘flat-track bully’ and pointed out how even Sehwag had his own troubles, and enjoyed luxuries that Shaw currently doesn’t have.
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In his column for ESPNCricinfo, Aakash Chopra wrote, “Shaw has already scored a fifty in New Zealand (in only two Tests there); Sehwag didn’t score a fifty in five Tests in New Zealand. Sehwag’s average in England and South Africa (two extremely challenging countries for a s subcontinen opener to play in) is 27 and 25, respectively. Sehwag has stellar numbers in Australia but that’s only one of the four countries that are considered the hardest for a subcontinent batsman.”
He further added, “And let’s also acknowledge and not downplay the fact that Sehwag was part of India’s strongest batting order ever. Having briefly been a part of it myself, I can tell you that that takes away some of the pressure of failure. This is something a modern Indian opener will know only when he’s playing in the subcontinent, and not in South Africa, New Zealand, England or Australia.”
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Chopra elaborated, “The second thing about the comparisons with Sehwag are that pitches overall were flat in Sehwag’s era. The quality of batting coupled with better pitches globally invariably produced numbers to match. I am simply trying to highlight that comparisons between him and Shaw are flawed. Sehwag failed too, and he looked woefully out of sorts on occasion, but the knives were not out against him every time he nicked the ball or got bowled.”
Shaw became a joking material on social media and memes even prior to the first Test, and social media was filled with “told you so” statements the moment the 21-year-old got dismissed in a duck in the first innings. However, Chopra opined that there is currently a toxic characteristic within fans where a lot of people are eagerly waiting for the failure of the youngster, so they can gloat that their intuition was right.
Elaborating the same, Akash Chopra said, “The other problem with anyone who doesn’t match our profiling is that subconsciously we wait for them to fail, for that vindicates our original belief. Shaw is going through that phase right now. His lack of runs in the IPL this year, and more importantly, the mode of his dismissals (the ball sneaked through his defences quite often) got everyone talking again.”
Despite his blistering start to Test cricket when he scored a century against the West Indies, Shaw looks set to be dropped for the all-important Boxing Day clash at the MCG.
