If I were a cricketer!!!

I live in India. And I love my India. But that doesn't in any way mean that I'm a good cricketer does it?


I was playing cricket (forced into playing, rather!) the other day and its common for people, especially if they're Indian, to "assume" that any person on earth can do at least one thing- no, not write or read- at least one thing means either bat or bowl.
The question was thrown at me. "A little bit of both", I lied blatantly, I didn't have a choice, did I? So the teams were split and our team won the toss. "BATTING" they all voted unanimously!! There certainly is some undefinable force in all these people that batting is the "royal" thing to do. If you win the toss, you bat. If you chose otherwise, either you're a moron, or a cricketer with no knowledge (which once again goes back to moron).
The two experienced batsmen in our side opened the batting and scored some runs (extremely valuable runs for our team!!) After the fall of a couple of wickets, I was called upon. Oh! Not agaaaaaaain! The ball, a small round spherical solid with an even surface, thrown at a high speed towards my humble bat by a bowler after running a quarter of a mile. How I wished it would just touch my bat and race away to the boundary!! Or better still, it would miss me entirely, go behind my back and reach the boundary!! My team would earn five runs, without me having to face that scary thing. But you cant be that lucky.I missed a couple of balls, touched one of them which went to a fielder at deep backward point and I was picked up a single. What ecstasy!! I scored a run!!
This went on for a while, I scored at a rate shameful to even a five day match, with lots of protests from team members behind me. The innings came to an end five overs later, an over after I had gotten out for a humiliating nine runs of nineteen balls, caught behind by the keeper. With a modest total at our hands to defend (...thank God they had only one "me" or we wouldn't have scored a thing!), with lots of enthusiasm, my team took the field. The match went on, with me fielding at extra cover and not a lot many balls coming my way. I misfielded once, and because the guy at long off was standing way too straight, the ball raced along the ground to the boundary. What an insult - X-(.
Anyway, I did take a catch of the guy who had hit that four in the next over to make up for things lost. The captain risked handing me the ball for the second last over, with the opponents needing thirteen runs off twelve balls and four wickets in hand. I bowled my humble slow balls which dont even spin much, and this is what happened -

1. WIDE (required 12 off 12)
2. WIDE (required 11 off 12) and lots of screams from the fielders!!
3. Good ball finally...played to midwicket and no runs taken (11 off 11)
4. Slightly outside off-stump... ball beats the bat... wippeee (11 off 10)
5. Little more room outside off-stump... squarely driven to the boundary for four (7 off 9) How much they shouted..darn!
6. Straight ball at middle stump lifted up high...very high...long on making no mistake in taking the catch...AND I PICKED UP A WICKET!!! (7 off 8)
7. New batsman in...OVERSTEPPING...defends it back to me (6 off 8)
   
8. And now the ball which really decided the match... over the wicket, little short, heading towards middle stump...ball is lofted..."SOMEONE PLEASE CATCH IT" I scream!!! But how could they?!?! SIX RUNS over deep midwicket.
   

We lost the match, I was the hero of this one (for the opponents that is) and now there are more people who know how good I am at cricket!!


But here's what's wrong, why I am so vehemently unable to get things straight in cricket...Its not that I don't like cricket, I love it...I love watching the sport - Tendulkar stroking, Dravid defending, Zaheer swinging, Ishant bouncing, Irfan swerving, Yuvraj ransacking, Dhoni savouring, Sreesanth dancing - but when it comes to playing it, I have entirely no horizontal/ vertical/ diagonal judgment of a small ball that bounces off the ground, hits a wooden stick and goes flying into space!! I mean, heck, I see a small ball coming towards me and all that goes through my mind is - "Fly away ball, don't come close to me!!". If I'm bowling, my hand seems to disobey everything my brain asks it to do!! I don't know if its a paralactic error in my judjement of moving objects or just a lack of skill that the sport possibly requires. I am not allergic to balls, thats for certain. I mean, I don't see a football the way I see a cricket ball and hence, a performance many times better is awarded. The same applies for the small table-tennis ball, which obeys my orders! But a cricket ball, he is anti-me, he is bad, he is naughty and disobeying, he is not an ideal ball X-( !! Well, it is true that we all cannot be a King of all trades, and maybe playing cricket isn't my trade.


But yes, I am looking forward to the Champions Trophy to watch some good quality cricketing action from the Gold mines of South Africa!! And hope no one tosses the ball towards me to celebrate a victory or express anger over a defeat. But if it does happen, I will take to the field again to see if something has changed, if my cricketing skills are better, if some "tooth fairy" has blessed me with a gift of cricketing. Until then, its a wait! But one thing is for sure... right now, the cricket ball is certainly not in my court!!!