"Let's look at cricket from a child's eyes. Right at the beginner's level. Age six or seven.
In terms of team sport you experience football, in which you would normally play every time you turn up at practice, are running around and kicking a ball. You get to wear colourful shirts, with different names on their backs. Messi one day, Ronaldo the next.
Then there's cricket: which at the start doesn't even seem natural. You have to stand sideways holding a bat and even when given a ball, you cannot throw it. Throw, you are told, is a very bad word. You are about six or seven years old. When getting into sport, it is hardly surprising that you will find football more attractive.
Then, what has not changed in junior cricket in the last three decades since I began is the routine: wake up at 5:30, get ready, quick breakfast, travel a good 30 kilometres to the ground. Play the match and get back home by 6pm if the traffic hasn't been too bad. Here's the toughest part, which is also the same.
At that match, as a young nine or ten-=year-old cricketer, sometimes you don't even play. Sometimes you get out the first ball and have nothing to do for the rest of the day.
On worse occasions, the umpire gives you a bad decision because you were batting too slow in an improbable chase and just delaying his return home. Sometimes, you just do nothing the whole day, get shouted at by your coach for not giving the star player water, the instant he asked for it.
At some point, how could no ten-year-kid, ask himself or herself, if it's worth all the effort?
What is the modern parent's view of this situation? They look at cricket and say that's a lot of time away from home. For which their son or daughter could spend hours waiting for a turn to bat or merely sitting because they have been dismissed early.
What I am trying to say here is that our world, particularly in the big cities, has changed dramatically. It means cricket's own appeal to both children and parents has changed considerably. The generation when you could say that "every Indian baby is born with a cricket bat in the hand" is well behind us.
I feel that strongly because I can see more Indian children in the cities taking up other sports. Cricket is not their first game anymore. A leading sports equipment manufacturer tells me that in the last four-five years, the percentage of sales of cricket equipment in the children's category, has gone down when compared to the sales of footballs, table tennis and badminton racquets and swimming gear.
This is great for India's sporting ecosystem; having been involved with a few Olympic and Paralympic athletes, it is very gratifying to see young children attracted to a range of other sport.
The cricketer in me is a little apprehensive about this trend. Not because other sports are getting more popular, but because we may not be doing enough to attract children to cricket and from there, we could lose out some talented youngsters.
Video- http://www.bcci.tv/videos/id/1573/rahul-dravid-delivers-the-2015-16-mak-pataudi-memorial-lecture
In terms of team sport you experience football, in which you would normally play every time you turn up at practice, are running around and kicking a ball. You get to wear colourful shirts, with different names on their backs. Messi one day, Ronaldo the next.
Then there's cricket: which at the start doesn't even seem natural. You have to stand sideways holding a bat and even when given a ball, you cannot throw it. Throw, you are told, is a very bad word. You are about six or seven years old. When getting into sport, it is hardly surprising that you will find football more attractive.
Then, what has not changed in junior cricket in the last three decades since I began is the routine: wake up at 5:30, get ready, quick breakfast, travel a good 30 kilometres to the ground. Play the match and get back home by 6pm if the traffic hasn't been too bad. Here's the toughest part, which is also the same.
At that match, as a young nine or ten-=year-old cricketer, sometimes you don't even play. Sometimes you get out the first ball and have nothing to do for the rest of the day.
On worse occasions, the umpire gives you a bad decision because you were batting too slow in an improbable chase and just delaying his return home. Sometimes, you just do nothing the whole day, get shouted at by your coach for not giving the star player water, the instant he asked for it.
At some point, how could no ten-year-kid, ask himself or herself, if it's worth all the effort?
What is the modern parent's view of this situation? They look at cricket and say that's a lot of time away from home. For which their son or daughter could spend hours waiting for a turn to bat or merely sitting because they have been dismissed early.
What I am trying to say here is that our world, particularly in the big cities, has changed dramatically. It means cricket's own appeal to both children and parents has changed considerably. The generation when you could say that "every Indian baby is born with a cricket bat in the hand" is well behind us.
I feel that strongly because I can see more Indian children in the cities taking up other sports. Cricket is not their first game anymore. A leading sports equipment manufacturer tells me that in the last four-five years, the percentage of sales of cricket equipment in the children's category, has gone down when compared to the sales of footballs, table tennis and badminton racquets and swimming gear.
This is great for India's sporting ecosystem; having been involved with a few Olympic and Paralympic athletes, it is very gratifying to see young children attracted to a range of other sport.
The cricketer in me is a little apprehensive about this trend. Not because other sports are getting more popular, but because we may not be doing enough to attract children to cricket and from there, we could lose out some talented youngsters.
Video- http://www.bcci.tv/videos/id/1573/rahul-dravid-delivers-the-2015-16-mak-pataudi-memorial-lecture