A superpower demands supermen!

By John Cheeran
Why have the recent defeats suffered by the Indian cricket team led to an outcry, out of all proportions?
May be taking the cue from the Marxist historian CLR James, one should look for the answer beyond the boundaries.
All around, success stories are bandied about how India is conquering the world.
There are the Tatas putting their price tag to the Corus steel corporation, the United States accommodating Indian nuclear interests much more and rating agencies are referring to China and India as the new superpowers.
A CIA report forecasts that the 21st century will be India’s.
Banks predict that India will become the world’s third largest economy in the next couple of decades.
Is India, then, a superpower?
In New Delhi seminars are held with the theme “India: The Next Global Superpower?
And Indian space scientists are planning (or hoping is the right word?) to send an astronaut to the Moon in the next 10 years. An Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) official has said: “A successful manned mission to the Moon will give India the status of a superpower.”
Well, if that is the prevailing mood in India, the breast beating about Indian cricket team’s losses at home and abroad may be understood better.
How can a superpower lose, and lose abroad in an abject manner as that happened in Durban?The nation demands that its cricketers live up to the superpower status bestowed on India in the recent times.
The nation demands that its cricketers turn themselves into supermen.
A superpower requires supermen.
We can no longer afford to be a nation that is whipped by others.
India mirrors the scene in the United States, which boasts of a world series for baseball, a game that has a narrow global appeal similar to cricket. Despite some serious challenges from Cuba, the US have kept their dominance in baseball intact.
India, however, is trying to dominate and emerge as the superpower in a sport that is played with a serious intent only in eight countries! And success is still far away.
In a nation with a few sporting heroes, and with little choice between cricketers and other athletes, the anguish and frustration that run parallel with the national cricket team can be understood.
India’s economic transformation is reflected so far only in the coffers of the Indian cricket board. A booming economy has helped the BCCI to sell successfully the telecast rights for the Indian team’s games for an obscene amount. The Indian cricket board is happy to flex its financial muscle to the International Cricket Council and have its way on contract disputes.
But for the average Indian cricket fan, neither the nation’s superpower status nor the BCCI’s rich coffers offers any solace.
He is still doomed to watch his heroes fumble the lines at the global stage.