A love lost, A life gained

Cradling the Lost Treasures

I think MS as a Test Captain deserves more respect. Yeah he has not been consistent overseas but he did make us no.1 Test Team for the first time. His home record is excellent because of spinners but you need a pace attack for overseas. The decline in him winning games came because of that transition phase between 2011-2013 when the team was being rebuilt, Zak their main pace attack bowler had injuries, Ishant had injuries and was in and out of form, Ashu was in and out too, without a substantial pace attack you really can't win overseas. It should be noted that in the pace quartet that actually transformed our performances overseas, Jassi, Bhuvi, Shami, and Ishant; three debuted under MS. Honestly, he did the right thing giving up test captaincy but I wish he had played a bit longer. He was an exciting player, except Indians literally everyone has called him a good Test wk/batter. 5k runs is a good record, he falls just behind Gilchrist and Sangakkara in overall Test performances, above Mark Boucher. That is a stat to be immensely proud of, not bad at all.

I think he was tired of the constant bashing he kept getting, 2013-2014 were horrendously difficult years for him. According to Ishant who was batting with him on that last Test of his, trying to save the match, Mahi decided to resign right there on the pitch. I cannot imagine the pressure he was under to finally be like I am done, I can't do this anymore. Mahi is a player who flourishes when under fire, but those years it was not just his game under fire was it? The year was a replay of 2007, accused senselessly of things he didn't do, things he could never do and things he would rather die than do. He used to bat with tailenders his entire life trying to keep it of others. Accusing him is stupid. I think that was the only instance where it took a toll on him and he decided to pull out.

I know Rahul was right when he gave the role of the finisher to him "Nobody can finish like Dhoni does"; he himself is in an awe over how Mahi functions in a chase (it is endearing to me the way he is like looooook at this boy, look at what he can do, how does he do it? So amazing, so brilliant). But I can't help but wonder what it would have been like had Mahi remained a top order destructive batsman like Sourav had initially intentioned him to be. I still selfishly wish I could have seen more from him. So does Sourav who wishes he had played up the order just a bit more, played a bit longer in Tests. As the man who spotted his immense talent, who saw his raw potential, he more than anyone else wanted his boy to play for himself just a little bit more. 

Also (the credit isn't theirs, they are still starving us, this was the interviewer and the promotions team that got us these crumbs) the new Mahi-Sakshi moment just dropped. Sakshi being an absolute boss and knowing how to curse in idk different languages and Mahi refusing to have a hand in it though I absolutely do believe he knows what they are and what they mean. 

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Mahi lasted all of a single day on the bed. See he knew how much he had changed since April. He had practically spent half the break on his bed moping, the other half in the field practicing. But that was the thing, he did spend the rest of the time playing. He had discovered very early on that cricket sort of helped keep him sane. He would probably had not made this far if he had not had it to keep him moving.

His fever was going down bit by bit, though the cold threatened to persist. It meant he was way more aware of his discomfort instead of passing out every hour. And that was just the physical aspect. Mentally, increased awareness was reminding him of everything that had happened to him in the past year. Just a year ago, around this time, he was playing in Nairobi with India A. Had he even thought he would get a place in the national team? Not really. It was an unserious fantasy for him. Now he had basically taken over the room of his idol, the larger than life men he was used to hearing about had basically taken the role of his elder brothers. He had scored a century at the biggest stage of cricket. He had basically won himself a life he hadn't even dared to dream of. Then he had lost the person he HAD dreamt a life with. It had screwed everything out of perspective for him. He was having a hard time focusing on what should be his priorities. He had had to face the harsh truth that his mental state had taken a solid hit, which by itself was a blow. He wasn't self sufficient anymore. He didn't know how to take control of his own mind again. And with idle time on his hands, not even a practice session to distract him, his mind had taken the liberty of taking him on a flashback journey. Currently Sonu, Irfan and Yuvi were hanging around; probably had been told to keep him company, literally no one had subtlety in this team; but they were being entirely useless and completely focused on some boring movie. He wanted a distraction. Anything would do.