Farewell Dravid

His batting could be classical, yet he never viewed himself as the classical hero. As he said: “My only qualification is that I come on television more than a nurse or a soldier or a teacher. Anyway, I don’t think sportsmen can really be considered heroes.” Indeed, in the evening after his retirement press conference, he suggested with amusement that his immediate future included “practising my new sweep shot with a broom”.

So two matches at The Oval that, I submit, encapsulate what Rahul has meant to English cricket lovers. While Sachin – perhaps distracted by the hoopla over breaking a record that nobody even knew existed until it was created for him, bespoke – floundered on that 2011 tour, Rahul’s reputation grew even greater in this country. It is hard, sacrilegious I dare say, for Indian fans to consider, but I believe that in the UK at least, Rahul’s bravery, modesty, professionalism and courtly determination make him even more loved than Tendulkar.

Dravid will be remembered as the man in the middle of India's great triumvirate. VVS Laxman and Sachin Tendulkar may have performed feats more easy on the eye, but what that uncharacteristic innings at Taunton 13 years ago demonstrates is that Dravid is the ultimate team man. If it meant dropping anchor, down it went and there it stayed. He is the most steadfast player in the modern game. Equally if a different tempo was required, Dravid did his utmost to deliver.

I find it hard to think of a more versatile cricketer. You were one of our finest short leg fielders. You were, for the most part, a remarkable slip catcher. You have opened the innings, batted at No.3, batted at No.6 (from where you conjured up that 180 in Kolkata). I’m sure you have batted everywhere else. You have kept wicket, offering an added dimension to the one-day side in two World Cups. You even scored 145 in one of those games. You captained both the Test and one-day teams. Sure, things didn’t go according to plan but you were a superb on-field captain. More importantly you were India’s finest vice-captain, an aspect that is often conveniently forgotten. Jeez, you even took some wickets.

The funniest moment that I remember about Rahul is when we won the Adelaide Test against Australia in 2003-04. We finished the game around lunch time but Rahul had his cricket gear on till well after dinner. He was so excited that he didn't even bother to change his whites! Rahul had that excitement for the game from the first day of his career till the last.

I still remember during my first trip to New Zealand in 1998, Javagal Srinath wanted Rahul, who was then standing at slips at short leg. But there was already another fielder placed at short leg. Srinath insisted that Rahul was brought on, and he took a blinder of a catch to pack off McMillan.

The man's a marvel because he was, like my great hero Steve Waugh, a warrior. The Indian team uniform was his battle fatigues. The bat was both his sword and his shield, more often the latter. He was not a creator/destroyer in the Tendulkar-Richards mould. He could never be that. Dravid did not have their outrageous genius. He was more Boycott than Bradman but without the selfishness of the English opener.

It is now unanimously agreed that the Golden Age of Indian cricket (which is now officially over) commenced in March 2001 when India beat Australia after following-on in the second Test at Kolkata. From then till June 2006 when India won a series in West Indies for the first time in 35 years on the back of another series-defining performance from Dravid, he was indisputably the leading man of Indian Test cricket. But not many had noticed because of the ridiculous accent on individual-oriented aggregate statistics – the Neanderthal evaluation method in cricket.

Eight out of Dravid’s ten highest impact batting performances of his career are from this period. Two are after this period, interestingly none before it. This tells a very clear story – how Indian cricket changed between 1996 and 2011, and the hugely significant contributions Dravid made towards that change.

He spent more time in the nets than the others, he worked on his fitness, he worked on the little things that came easily to the others, and he worked on keeping his head above water… why he even worked on his wicket-keeping to stay in the ODI team. But hard work has a sort of mortal, doable quality to it. We can all work hard – if we have the motivation and the belief… that’s all it takes. But to do it over 17 years requires the kind of genius that not everyone is born with; the genius of hard work.

Like everything else Dravid, nothing was left to chance even in the final farewell ... That Dravid was nearer the end than ever before was not in doubt, but the fact that several people were asking why — rather than why not — showed that he got the timing of his retirement just right.

To talk of Dravid's ability tells only half the story. He exhibited greatness at its most humble, and is one of the most impressive men to play the game: dignified, fair-minded, eloquent (he never used a ghostwriter), gentle, yet tougher than we will ever realise. A Gary Cooper for the new millennium; the kind of man you'd want your son to grow into.