Indians are like that

One of the recurrent themes in the gabfest about Chappell's departure is the inability of Indians to deal with straight talk. In this view the robust candour that comes naturally to Australians is something that thin-skinned, hero-worshipping, neurotically sensitive desis find hard to deal with. Sanjay Manjrekar had a version of this view in an audio interview on cricinfo.com . Having hired a foreign coach, he said, the Indians should have braced themselves for the frankness that was likely to come their way, even if it was alien to their nature, but they didn't. Chappell held up the mirror to Indian cricket and Indian cricket wasn't brave enough to look at the ugly truth. Also, says Manjrekar, the storm over Chappell is beside the point because cricket coaches don't make much difference to the team's fortunes. It's the players who are responsible for victory and defeat.

That's good to know.

Actually India did have a foreign coach who dealt quite well with his team for nearly five years. John Wright's tenure didn't make the Indian team a squad of world-beaters but it did rather better than this team has done under Chappell. But Wright was a creature of the team's senior players, argue some, while Chappell refused to accept that individual cricketers could be bigger than the team. Chalk up another one for the straight-talking Aussie, the coach as lion-tamer.

This is orientalist nonsense.

It can be plausibly argued that the problem with Chappell wasn't his candour, it was his propensity to intrigue. Several cricket journalists I've read or spoken to (and this includes Chappell's protagonists) testify to his habit of sending sms messages to journalists leaking his views on players, selection and policy. The players who disliked him complain about how manipulative he was. They might be wrong and self-interested but it's odd that Indian journalists and commentators should find the stereotype of the straight-talking Australian and the truth-denying Indian easier to credit than the chorus of allegations that Chappell's preferred mode for communicating with the media was the modern equivalent of harem whispers.

Just as odd is the 'balanced' view that equates criticism of Chappell and his methods with a willful blindness to the structural problems of Indian cricket. I find no difficulty in holding in my head (at the same time) two related but distinct ideas: 1) that the BCCI presides over a mess and 2) that Chappell is a terrible coach. The need for structural reform and the necessity of making the best of what you currently have aren't contradictory goals. A good coach will have a vision of the future, but his primary job is in the here and now. Chappell had poor results in the here and now when he coached the national side in arguably the worst organized cricket system in the world (India) and he had indifferent results when he coached a provincial side in the best organized cricket system in the world (Australia). It seems to me that Chappell is the constant here.

Clint Eastwood was a great star who returned to the movies to direct others in hugely successful films. Greg Chappell as coach is Clint Eastwood in age…only without the hits. Speaking for myself, I'm delighted he's gone.