The Champs were here...

"Men are haunted by the vastness of eternity. And so we ask ourselves: will our actions echo across the centuries? Will strangers hear our names long after we are gone, and wonder who we were, how bravely we fought, how fiercely we loved?"

These are the lines from the movie “Troy”. Heroes come. And heroes go. And some just leave their marks on the sheet of history for ever. Since time immemorial, we have seen legends. Legends- who have shaped the future of this planet. Legends- whose mere presence gives their men a ray of hope, even when there is none. Legends- who give their opponents a reason to worry, a reason to time and again feel thwarted. These, are men of honour.

Now, let me talk of cricket in India. Here. Cricket is not just another sport. It is, well, as the cliché goes, a religion in itself. And like most clichés, it is a cliché because it is so very true. Each and every citizen of this nation is glued to their TV sets, come India playing. And the opponent? It doesn’t matter. Among all these citizens, the age group that is concerned with the maximum audience population is the one around 8-20 years. The school going kids mostly. So it is no surprise that I, being 20 years old, am almost done with my full-fledged, intense cricket viewing years of my life. For me, 1995-2007 were those years.

Let me get a bit statistical. Which batsman scored the maximum number of runs in ODIs? Sachin Tendulkar. In tests? Brian Lara. Maximum wickets in ODIs? Wasim Akram. In tests? Muttiah Muralitharan. Highest number of centuries in both ODIs and tests? Sachin Tendulkar again. Arguably the best fielder ever? Jonty Rhodes. The most invincible team? Steve Waugh’s team of 2000-’01, and Ricky Ponting’s team of 2006-’07, both winning 16 test matches on the trot. Highest individual score in an ODI inning? Saeed Anwar. In test matches? Brian Lara. Fastest ODI hundred, Shahid Afridi. And when we think about the subsequent records that follow, for both, the batsman, and the bowlers, we see the names of Steve Waugh, Rahul Dravid, Inzamam-ul-Haq, Ricky Ponting, Saurav Ganguly, Md. Yousuf, Sanath Jayasuriya, Stephen Fleming, Kevin Pietersen, Gary Kirsten, Matthew Hayden, Chris Cairns, Mark Waugh, Jacques Kallis, Md. Azharuddin, Shane Warne, Glenn McGrath, Anil Kumble, Waqar Younis, Saqlain Mushtaq, Courtney Walsh, Curtly Ambrose, Brett Lee, Alan Donald, Shaun Pollock, and the list goes on.

If we view this list properly, we see that most of these players played their best in the time span of 1995-2007. Now, someone has correctly said, “Statistics are like mini-skirts. They show enough to create interest, but hide what’s most important.” Yes, statistics do reveal that these have been the very best ever. But what they are hiding is the sheer manner in which they have played their cricket, the amount of dominance that they have had on their opponents. If one has caused the other to have nightmares of him, the other, if he loses his record of being the highest run getter in a single test inning, wins it back the same year. And as a matter of fact, the one who broke the former’s record also lies in the list. These are the men who have shaped the face of world cricket for the past many years. One doesn’t love or hate people like these, one respects them.

But they can’t keep on playing for ever. One day, all of them will retire. Some already have. But the world will know them, as the greatest to have ever lived. And it will be tough for any man to step into the giant shoes that these men would have left. Surely some great players will come, but I doubt anyone erasing the marks that these men would have left on the walls of time.

And as a cricket fan, not just an Indian cricket fan, I personally have witnessed the greatest cricketers ever on display. No one knows if such gems, so many of these together, on one stage, will ever come here again. These past 10-12 years, according to me, have been the greatest world cricket has ever seen. If they ever tell my story, let them say, I lived in the same world in which legends lived. Men rise and fall like the winter wheat. But these names will never die. Let them say I lived in the times of the great Sachin Tendulkar, untamed and undefeated. Let them say I lived in the times, of the great Steve Waugh.