Even Stevens

When cricket pundits all around the world are losing a great deal of sleep wondering what’s wrong with the status quo of Indian cricket, I in a moment of ‘deathbed conversion’ actualized that you don’t need a ‘JARVIS’ to solve the Gordian knot, all you need to do is to turn back to your school days and dig into your closet for your chemistry text book, a certain gentleman by the name of ‘Henry Louis Le Chatelier’ has done the complete psychoanalysis in the 19^th century, perhaps, what he did not know was people will utilize his doctoral in an altogether new realm.

                                       

“If a chemical system at equilibrium experiences a change in concentration, temperature, volume, or partial pressure, then the equilibrium shifts to counteract the imposed change and a new equilibrium is established”- The Le Chatelier Principle.

This principle, I am pretty sure will not only help some media bosses roll out a few new editions of their paper but also aid the tacit cricketers in press conferences to rationalize their current plight. 

The fact of the matter is, It all evens up… just when we thought that Indian cricket had hit the purple patch and was going all guns blazing to make the cricketing world its own fiefdom (read the imposed change), we had the English whitewashing our dreams of a Brownwash (read the equilibrium shift), and we were dethroned from our position (Equilibrium re-established).

The cricketing ‘closed mass system’ has its actions and counter moves. The predators from the subcontinent, India and Sri Lanka are squirming overseas, thanks to their classical ineptitude against fast bowling. On the other hand, the No. 1 Test team, England, was made to look completely out of sorts by Pakistan’s Saeed Ajmal. This is the equilibrium of international cricket: Asian teams capitulate to the chin music of the fast and rising red cherry; and the resilience of the rest of the world takes the form of an egg shell against the bulldozer of the crafty spin bowling of the Asians, so no team gets too ahead of itself.

                                     “And the Equilibrium stays balanced”

                                 

The Australians are looking good against an under confident and underperforming India, but wait till they get to lock their horns with the likes of the South Africans or the English. What last 4-5 months of cricket and the movie ‘MONEYBALL’ has taught me is that cricket is not decided on paper and starting line ups, had it been that way the Indians would’ve ruled the roost. The players, like cogs of a gear wheel need to fit into their right places, that’s the only way matches are won. 

The sport has manifested into a corporate affair of late, 'you perform or you perish', with so much at stakes huge houses are pouring in large amount of money in anticipation of better results, what they need to realize is that the catalyst (read money) won't affect the position of the equilibrium. 

I've been watching and living The SPORT for over a decade now, and I know one thing for sure, that making prophecies and convincing others in its favor in this business is like forcing an Albino into buying a fairness cream, but still I’ll take that giant leap of faith in my presentiment, and utter these cricketing equivalent of Satanic verses:

After the long and steep uphill climb on the Mount Everest of success, the Proteas (read South Africa) deserve their moment quite literally at the ‘TOP OF THE WORLD’.