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Cheteshwar Pujara is the new Cheteshwar Pujara

by Gaurav Sethi




Today I feel as if I’ve scored a Test double hundred. What’s better, I have a celebratory whiskey by my side, mid-test, as I type.

I doubt Che Pujara will have any of that. Here’s raising my glass to him. I don’t recall when an Indian batsman made a double hundred – and I’m not in the least inclined to check who it was. If you know who it was and when it was, please do tell.

It’s seems like a long, long time ago.  

Today it feels like Indian cricket has taken a new turn, and a new twist is just around the corner.

Some things, when they happen, appear destined to – like this double hundred, with the asterisk alongside. A not-out, holy mother of cricketing Gods, a not-out. What must his average be like today. In the 60s. Here’s to the average. Raising glass again.

To salvage Test cricket, every team needs a zealous, run making monk – one who doesn’t tire of scoring runs, big runs, non-stop runs, match after match runs, even boring runs. South Africa has Amla. England has Cook. West Indies has Chanderpaul. Who does India have sitting under cricket’s banyan tree?

Refill.

I’ve been wanting to process the Dravid-Pujara equation. But for that, I think I have to process Dravid’s retirement first, and like Megha and Nicol, I don’t think I have. The day of his retirement, I fled to Goa, think March 10th or 11th it was. I nearly missed an early check-in and good seats because of that retirement interview. It made me feel sick and sad, freeze in the shower. Goa was timely, I wanted distance from a cricketing death.
  
But today is Che Pujara’s day.

Stay fit, stay strong, play long.

There will be comparisons, and I’m not sure they shouldn’t be – it’s a tempting cricketing equation. Dismissing it in a tweet won’t do.

Legacy, articulate, dignity, straight, complex. Does that describe the past or the present.

It’s one down, number three, in early, when the teams swirly.

You need a man, not someone’s who’s cute and girly.
 





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