Former India player Sunil Gavaskar slammed modern-day cricketers for their attitude after South Africa were dismissed for a mere 116 in the first ODI against India. He believes that it’s because them having too many other options in the T20 League across the world to make money. Winning the toss and batting first, South Africa displayed no resistance on a stunning Wanderers wicket. They faced their lowest ODI total at home as well.
Speaking to Star Sports after the game, Gavaskar said, “Today, players have options. You play for your country, you play T20 leagues… you still can put the food on the table. And therefore there is this tendency to go bang-bang (with the bat)! (There is a tendency) If they don’t score runs, if they don’t take wickets, if they get dropped, so what? They will still have some T20 contract somewhere, if not with the IPL, then some league or the other.”
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He further added: “That makes players take a lot less responsibility. They try to take the easy way out, which is to go ‘bang-bang’. If they succeed, great. If they don’t, the team is 116 all out. So what? There will be another match two days later. Back in my day, we didn’t have too many options. If we failed, we had to go back to club cricket. And there was no money in club cricket back then.”
However, Team India chased down the target in a mere 16.4 overs to register the second-worst ODI defeat for South Africa (in terms of balls remaining) and take a 1-0 series lead as well. The pace duo of Arshdeep Singh and Avesh Khan combined to take nine of the ten wickets with a stunning display of pace bowling as well.
At the post-match presentation, a disappointed Aiden Markram blamed the individual batters and said that they have better plans to combat trying conditions as well.
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“Tough one. Winning the toss, batting first we would have wanted to bat well. Credit to the Indian bowlers. We were behind from the very first ball. Couldn’t recover. We expected it to go around a little bit. In the first 6-7 overs, it does do a bit. Today, it lasted a little longer and they bowled well. Comes down to individuals. It is up to them to assess and then plan it forward. We need to take smart options in a given situation,” said Markram.
