Be A Sport!

I'm an avid sports fan and when I mention that in casual conversation, the first question thrown at me is most probably 'Oh..so what sport do you play?'

I often reply hesitantly 'Well, I don't really play many sports. I used to play tennis, but I wasn't very good at it' and receive sympathetic nods. Sometimes, I've been brave enough to say 'Well, I'm excellent at scrabble'. Some laugh and point out that scrabble 'is not a sport.' Well, it is a serious sport in Senegal. But this is not the case in many other countries.

Which leads to the questions that confront me today: 'What makes a sport? What is the criteria that must be satisfied for something to qualify as a sport? Does sport, by definition, refer to a process that involves 'physical' skill? If so, why is chess a sport? How is scrabble any less a sport than chess?

The debate over the very definition of sport is a complicated and highly-contested one. Scrabble and Chess, for instance, involve more concentration than test match cricket would. Wikipedia defines sport as '…activity that is governed by a set of rules or customs and often engaged in competitively' This is a broader definition, and one that in my opinion, is better suited. 'Mind games' often involve more strategy and intense concentration than a traditional sport.

A scrabble competition is underway..

Joel Sherman, National Scrabble Champion from San Diego makes an important point: "I trained for 100 hours in the past month. It's been proved that as we're thinking, we're burning calories at a rate similar to doing an activity that requires physical exertion." Extending this logic a little, one can think of spelling bees, that phenomenon that Indian-origin kids have made their own, as a sport too. 

Much of the concept of sport evolves from a conventional idea of a 'sport', that people are conditioned to think of as a physical experience, one of sweat and injuries. Scrabble, for instance, is seen as too casual a household game, something like monopoly. But the truth is that professional, 'serious' scrabble involves a lot of skill, a lot of knowledge, a lot of quick thinking to form words, a massive vocabulary and a skill to form words and connect words with any given letters. Professional scrabble, that works with a timer and involves a lot of thinking and stress, is closer to chess than it is to monopoly.

Opinions vary regarding what makes something a sport and what doesn't, and it doesn't look like this very fascinating debate will conclude any time soon.  What's your take?

Recommended Reading:

Open Mic: What is a sport?

What is or isn't a sport?

A Letter to Daniel Vettori

Dear Mr.Vettori,

I’m probably the only Indian who felt more than a twinge of sadness that New Zealand received such a thrashing and was blanked out in the ODI series by India. As someone who has been a New Zealand fan for more than five years, the steady sloppiness of the team is disheartening.

But why would an Indian be a fan of New Zealand? Indeed it seems more acceptable for an Indian fan to support England or Australia or Sri Lanka, than New Zealand. After all, NZ hasn’t won a single world cup or major tournament. They don’t have a legend like Lara to boast of. They’re not big scorers. Nor are they amazing wicket-takers.

The question remains: Why this fascination for the New Zealand team? My answer would be that the fascination stems from an entirely old-fashioned, romantic idea of the game. This is an idea of a team that plays the ‘gentlemen’s game’ in the real sense of the phrase. This is an affinity towards the chivalrous underdog; the proverbial David who takes on Goliath.

Yours is a team that has won the ICC Spirit of Cricket award twice in a row. The cynics often say  that the spirit of cricket is all well and good, but cricket is about winning. This is a concept that a team that lost to Bangladesh 0-4 would find tough to understand, they point out. To them I say, I’d rather watch Vettori’s boys lose yet be sportsmen than watch Harbhajan slap Sreesanth.

It is wonderful to see a team that is exactly that: a team. A unit that is not always dependent on the big names to fire. Of course there is a Vettori and McCullum and there was a Bond, a Hadlee and a Cairns. But the players are never bigger than the team. Even at their best, when they’ve been touted as the ‘Dark Horses’ of any tournament, it was the team that was feared, not just a Bond or Vettori. This emphasis on team over self is one of the reasons it is lovely to see the NZ team field. Indeed your team has often made fielding seem like a synchronized, athletic art form.

Part of the charm of cricket, in my opinion, is the fact that for every instance of sledging, there is a cricketer who ‘walks’. For every Harbhajan and Symonds, there is a Rahul Dravid and a Daniel Vettori. And that’s exactly the reason I’m a New Zealand fan. Your team might not, in fact won’t, win every match it plays. Many a time I’ve turned on the TV to watch a game, knowing well the Black Caps won’t have an easy match. But it is so heartening to see your team put up a fight. It is the same reasoning that made Slumdog Millionaire a phenomenal success: there is nothing quite like rooting for an underdog and rejoicing when they triumph. 

It is time the NZ team stepped up and proved the 'nice guys finish last' cliche wrong. There is a lot of work to be done, but there is nothing impossible. You are an excellent cricketer whom I admire very much and I hope you shall review the awful performances over the past few months, without giving up. Nobody expects much from New Zealand now. Which is probably why this is the best time to do an overhaul if needed and get things right.

I shall be watching this team, as I always have, with expectations and hope that you will perform to your true potential.

Always a fan,

Kals

Related Links:

NZ Cricket hits rock bottom

Daniel Vettori expects captaincy to be reviewed after New Zealand's series defeat to India

In A League of Their Own

Caught up with the euphoria of the Indian contingent following up its wonderful Commonwealth Games performance with a best-ever medal tally at the Asian Games, not many of us remembered the fact that Cricket was making its debut in the Asian Games. A cricket crazy nation like India would have remembered this, had the Indian team been participating. Owing to 'other commitments', neither the women's cricket team nor their male counterparts made it to the games. Not even a second-rung team of junior players turned up. Possibly due to this, most of us didn't find the time to keep track of which 'amateur' team trumped over the other. 

A Neytiri-like depiction of a female Pakistani cricketer. Source: The Express Tribune

The news that many of us ended up missing out on was this: the Pakistan women's cricket team won the gold medal in the women's cricket category. For a nation ravaged by floods, violence, terror, 'pending economic catastrophe' and an embarrassing expose about members of its men's cricket team involved in spot fixing, this gold medal came as a healing balm of sorts. Indeed, President Asif Ali Zardari termed the victory as "as a gift to the nation riding on a series of crises".

With the Indian women's team, a strong contender for the Gold medal missing out, it was an easier task for the Pakistani women. The finals was a one-sided affair, with the Pakistani women routing their Bangladeshi counterparts with a ten-wicket win. 

These women come from a country, which like its neighbour India, would rather concentrate on the mediocre performances of its men than on the victories of its women. India would rather discuss Ravindra Jadeja than Jhulan Goswami. Pakistan too follows similar yardsticks. Hailing from a conservative society, playing a sport considered 'the gentleman's game' came with a whole gamut of challenges. In the words of Sana Mir, captain of the Pakistani team, “There is always TV coverage when the men’s team plays in Pakistan because it is huge, but you never see us playing on the big screen. I hope our triumph will change people’s attitude towards the game back home. Parents, in my view, would feel more confident in allowing their daughters to take up the sport.”

And that is exactly what one hopes would come out of this victory for Pakistan. It is one thing to watch Chak De! India and drown in patriotism or feminism and cheer for ‘the girls’. It is yet another thing to constantly and passionately keep track of the girls’ games and cheer them on.

The Indian women’s cricket team finished as runner-ups in the 2005 World Cup, an event that made news for that week at most and was re-telecast when the men weren’t playing any matches or when it was a slow news week. I hope that this victory of the Pakistani women’s team will have a more substantial impact on society, motivating many young women to play the sport that they love, without inhibitions. It is time we really gave a ‘Chak De!’ to our women in sports. 

Recommended Reading:

'Cricket is not a Gentleman's Game'

Pakistan women win historic gold at Asian Games