Sourav Ganguly: Victim of a revenge cult

All Dada can do here is refute the allegations that he made such comments while the reporter now has a credibility problem. What is known is that he has long been the fall guy when it comes to India's middle-order failures and you don't need the former captain to tell you that. It has been a known fact for a long time.

Now joining those snipers is some typically bad-mouthing Aussie who is doing his own ludicrous pantomime act.

To suggest that Ganguly had indulged in time wasting is an excuse for ignorance of the laws. The Channel Nine loud mouth overlooked that there were no overs lost, despite the interruptions. So why the fuss?

That the target was an impossible one is overlooked by such media bullies who snarl and snap when they can't get their way and attempt caricature humour to make a non-valid point.

How many Aussies in the past have also been involved in such a tactic to prevent defeat? Memories of a Perth Test against New Zealand in December 2001 resurface. Apart from several appalling umpiring decisions, they were calling for gloves and pads and other time-wasting tactic they could conjure.

The Kiwis didn't grumble, but you knew they weren't too happy either. There was Aussie criticism of Steven Fleming's plus 300-minute long century; no praise either for Daniel Vettori and his six wickets in the first innings that helped the Kiwis a good first innings lead. No honesty among thieves.

What needs to be appreciated here is that there is far, far more to Ganguly's style of play than statistical jargon and metaphorical branding.

He needs neither a register of meaningless allegories nor statistical lists that categorise who he is and from where he comes.

Yet for some peculiar reason, universally the Indian media, always seeking new cult heroes outside the outlandish tinsel confines of Bollywood, have this arcane obsession to indulge in such inane metaphors and clichés when discussing a man whose individual stylish left-hand batsmanship as well as leadership showed that Indians can take on the bullies from Down Under and elsewhere.

Those so fond of rehashing the meaningless 'Lord Snooty' as a way to unjustly caricature and pillory the man, or Prince of Calcutta to explain his elegant strokeplay, fail to understand his innate competitive drive.

There have been times when watching him place a cover drive suggests the soft growl of a Bengal tiger on the prowl. Here there is the impression of his sensing the mood of the bowler and by scoring a boundary in such a way it evokes an instinctive habit of his stalking of the bowler, seeking to hunt down the next ball as well.

There is a finesse about the Ganguly cover drive that hints how its execution is unique; it has nothing to do with textbook technique but his style of adventurism. He has had that trendy manner since before he was selected 16 years ago and sent to Australia.

Yet as he is about to say adieu to a Test career, Ganguly deserves fresh descriptions and a new landscape as a tribute to his skills and leadership: not old clichés or tired metaphors that have long failed to describe his style of game or intense personality.

There was agony in Australia in 1991-92 where he was largely misunderstood by a self-indulgent team management system; then a heroic debut century at Lord's a little more than four years later. These are all part of the often haphazard journey.

It is one though that deserves a far better epithet than it is receiving from a malevolent sniping media.