Mr. Irfan Pathan, former India team cricketer, Indian cricket commentator and analyst in conversation with renowned Indian sports writer and journalist Ayaz Memon.
Mr. Irfan Pathan, former India team cricketer, Indian cricket commentator and analyst in conversation with renowned Indian sports writer and journalist Ayaz Memon.
Ayaz: Thank you. It’s an absolute pleasure to be here and to be sitting alongside Irfan Pathan. He might not remember this, but I saw him play his first match. Adelaide, I think, 2003, test match. And then, of course, the hat trick that was mentioned earlier, the first over hat trick at Karachi. Salman Butt, Younis Khan, and Mohammed Yusuf. If my memory serves me right. So, I mean, just to kind of set the frame of reference of what Irfan has been about, we’ve got the stats and the figures. But I remember a conversation I had with Greg Chappell, who was coach of the Indian team for a while, didn’t exactly go out the way everybody thought it would, his coaching stint. But in that conversation Greg Chappell mentioned to me, watch out for three young guys from the Indian team. I said, who? He said, Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Gautam Gambhir, and Irfan Pathan. So I said, what is it that kind of makes them different? So he said, cricket brain. The brain thinks cricket all the time, and they’ve got leadership potential. These are his exact words. So, we had Mahendra Singh Dhoni becoming the captain of India. We’ve got Gautam Gambhir, who’s now become the chief coach of India. And now we’ve got Irfan Pathan, who’s an ace analyst and commentator. And obviously, there’s a lot more role further for you, I would imagine, in Indian cricket. But to also set a little kind of paradigm as to what Irfan is, there’s so much we know about Mahendra Singh Dhoni, who came from the boondocks of Ranchi, a very unfamiliar place for cricket. The background for a ticket collector to become an ace cricketer. Seemed like such a glorious story, and it’s been celebrated on celluloid.
Irfan Pathan’s background, also very appealing, very interesting, very fascinating. From a muezzin’s house, from the bylines of Baroda. And then you become an international cricketer. Under-19, great talent. In the wake of Kapil Dev, what we saw, the victory in the ’83 World Cup and the kind of record that Kapil established, performances, there was always this yearning that we are next all-rounder kab aayega, you know, high-quality all-rounder. And then we had Irfan coming in the late 1990s as an under-19 cricketer. And then in the first decade of this century, establishing himself, and now here he is sitting with us, not completely retired. He’s still playing Legend’s cricket. And of course, he’s in the commentary box every now and then. So, to get back to, you know, where you started, just a couple of questions because I then want to focus on the next four years ahead of India in International cricket after we won the T20 World Cup. How do you see India getting ahead?
So, your background? I mean, cricket, very unusual, very offbeat kind of a background. Was it just, you know, were you pushed into playing cricket or you brought cricket into your house?
Irfan: First of all, thank you so much Ayaz bhai, thank you so much Rotary Club and I can see quite a few familiar faces, Farhat Bhai, my dear friend for many years, Vitaji here and I met quite a few other friends as well, so good to be here, good to be alongside you. I know that the kind of work Rotary Club has been doing for many many years and I’ve been aware and I really appreciate that. We need great people like you and I really believe that more than the government, this country is run by good people and I can see some of the great people here, so thank you so much for having me here.
Aapka jo sawal hai, that you know how I started from the small background, when you said muezzin’s son, I remember my father. Obviously never stopped us from doing anything, my father used to earn Rs 3,500 a month after working 15 hours a day. So he was muezzin; he used to work for 8 hours at the Sarabhai M chemical factory in Baroda, and when he came back, he would be at the mosque throughout. We used to help him out in terms of sweeping the mosque, doing azaan sometimes as well. So he easily worked 15-16 hours a day, taking care of his 5-member family: me and my brother, my younger sister and my mother and obviously himself.
So, five of us, Rs 3,500 a month but not once did he stop us from playing cricket, never. Because to get the shoes at that time, I remember the spike shoes which we need for bowling, my first shoes were for Rs 550, so imagine if you cut down the percentage of Rs 3,500 to Rs 550, it’s a big chunk to get those kinds of shoes. So I remember asking him for the shoes and he said okay, we’ll get it done. Whatever we asked for in terms of our own limitations, he never stopped us. So, first and foremost, if my father had stopped us from playing cricket, I would not be sitting here. So I’m very grateful for my parents who actually allowed us to play cricket.
We lived in a mosque, obviously you can’t play cricket in a mosque, so we would go to the second floor of the mosque where there was a big room. Probably in terms of length, it was this bigger room which was empty for many years. There was a madrasa, it was closed for many reasons, the madrasa went somewhere else, so that area was empty and there were a lot of people who used to be very scared to go to that area because they thought there was a ghost there. It was very good for us, for me and my brother, because no one used to bother us. Aur humein bachpan mein lagta tha, agar bhoot pareshan karega toh usse fielding kara lenge. So we never had that fear, so me and my brother used to play for hours without any disturbance, so that was a big privilege for us. The pitch is ours, we can play as much as we can.
And then, there were two areas between my granny’s place and the mosque. One was called Baru Sahib and there was a small little garden where kids used to play. And one was called Rajpureki pole; it was like a street, there were a lot of young cricketers who used to play cricket as well. So we used to go there sometimes and be in their team. Cricket used to always excite us and when we saw that all the big guns like 16 years old, 17 years old, wanted both of us in their team as 9 year olds, 10 year olds. Then, my parents realised just how much we love cricket, so they called my uncle who used to be one of the friends of our coach, Mehndi Sheikh and Bashir Sheikh, Mangala Babar madam who played for India as well in sports clubs in Baroda.
So then, that’s how we started playing cricket because when we used to go to play street cricket, my mother had a scare in her head. My mother used to think agar ye ladkon ko mohalle mein khelne diya toh ye bigad jayenge. They might get spoiled. So okay, if they like cricket, let them go and play proper professional cricket. So when I was 10 years old, this is where I started my cricketing journey through the Baroda Sports Club. That’s how it’s all started.
Fantastic. It’s a fascinating story, isn’t it? I mean, anybody here who’s into celluloid productions can look at Irfan Pathan’s story. But he mentioned fleetingly about his brother, and that’s Yusuf Pathan, who also played for India, who played in the 2007 and 2011 World Cups. And currently he’s been a giant killer in the elections in Bengal. So, but contrasting, you become a fast bowler and an all-rounder. Yusuf was primarily a batsman and a big hitter.
I became a bowler because of my brother. Because to get him out, I used to actually bowl for hours. And if he gets a bowled, it’s a no-ball. If he gets caught, it’s not a clean catch. You know how the elder brothers are. I’m sure if you have siblings, you know. So all the elder brothers, they bully you. But by doing that, he used to help me as well. I remember that my legs became stronger than my brother’s. Because we had one cycle and that was a privilege. So our route was — from home, we used to go to school. So that’s one way. Then from school, we used to go to Motiba cricket ground. That’s when our cycle came. Motiba Cricket Ground was Baroda Cricket Association’s official ground for the state practice, like for under-14s, under-16s, under-19s. So we used to go to Motiba. So that’s the second route, from school to Motiba. From Motiba, we used to go to meet our coaches every day, regardless of what we do. We play matches and just to speak to the coaches and just to learn from them if something is there. And words of wisdom after the practice. That’s in the evening. So that’s the third route, towards the club. And then from the club, you come back home. So how many routes? Four routes are there. I used to ride my bicycle on three of those routes. And it used to be double savari. Because one cycle and two of us. So I used to ride the cycle and he would sit behind, because he is the elder brother, so he can relax. And he used to always find a way to be tired somehow. So he used to be sitting behind, he used to carry the kit bag, and I used to ride the cycle on the three routes. So this is why suddenly in a couple of years, I realised, I’m able to actually bowl better. I’m able to run better, and I’m able to bowl faster as well. So thanks to my brother, who actually made me bowl for hours, and bullied me a little, as well as bullied me in terms of riding the cycle as well. So my brother had a big part to play.
Jokes apart, actually my brother, who was the one who actually taught me how to hit sixes as well. How to handle the bat in terms of, if you handle the bat from the top hand, you would actually get the longer leverage. And this is what he taught me when I was about 12-13 years old. It was a monsoon and I was trying to hit him for sixes. I could not get him, even for a single ball, out of the park. So he came to me. He said, look, you’re actually holding the bat from way below. You need to stay slightly upright with your knees as well. And he’s actually young himself, but he could hit sixes from the word go. That was his natural talent. But then he taught me and then I picked it up and then I also started hitting sixes.
So now I’m going to kind of fast forward a bit and you spelled out what you did in your career and all. What I want to focus on is, when you came on the scene, people were looking for successors, fast building successors to Javagal Srinath, Venkatesh Prasad, Kapil Dev toh bahot pehle nikal gaye the, and there was always this lament, India has wonderful batsmen and spinners, but fast bowlers, and then suddenly, now when we see, we are actually, I mean, there’s an embarrassment, you have to pick 4-5 from a complement of 10-12 bowlers. So you started with your era in that sense, you, Ashish Nehra, Zaheer Khan, that age, and from now, when you look at Mohammed Shami, Jasprit Bumrah, Umesh Yadav, Mohammed Siraj, what do you see the change, how did this happen?
I think the biggest credit should be given to John Wright in terms of changing the mindset as far as fitness is concerned. As a fast bowler, you need to have solid fitness. And I remember when I joined the team, John Wright was the coach at that time. He was the one who actually changed the attitude of our culture. So our culture was very different. I had heard a lot of stories about our ex-cricketers and how they used to warm up. Do all of you know about Iodex? So they used to put Iodex on their body, and they used to go to the ground, and say, hamara warm up hogaya. This is genuine. That’s how they actually used to go to the ground in the name of warm up. So that’s the kind of fitness culture we had. This was not their fault as well, it was okay to have this kind of practice at that time. It was a special talent, like Bishan Singh Bedi and others, our OG Sunil Gavaskar, Kapil Dev, these were a few who were the exceptions. But apart from them, there no one else took the effort to warm-up or exercise as far as the whole team is concerned.
But when John Wright came, he definitely made sure that one thing which was going to take Indian cricket forward, was fitness. So then the fitness culture came. So by the time I came in, a lot of other fast bowlers like Zaheer, and Balaji came at that time as well. And all the fast bowlers, everyone had one thing in mind, that they needed to get better in terms of fitness. If we have better fitness, we’ll be able to actually perform better. Now the fitness level has gone to another level. When we used to train, it was a lot about hypertrophy training in terms of how to get bigger muscle, how to get stronger muscle. Then now in the last six, seven years, things have even gotten better in the name of functional training. So for you, functional training means you basically train according to the way you know to bowl and the way you know to bat, which is gonna help directly. So our fitness was different. Now fitness has gone to another level. Next 10 years, things will be even better. But one thing I need to caution Indian cricket as well. Yes, we have a lot of options, but with those options, we need to make sure, can we get a similar quality bowler like Jasprit Bumrah? Very difficult. He’s a once in a generation kind of bowler, but somewhere close to him – can we target that for the next two to three years or maybe in the next five years? Can we get someone like him or similar to him? Even 70% of Bumrah, can we get, can we get someone like Mohammed Shami in terms of his quality, in terms of the same position? Because if you look at both the bowlers, Bumrah has got nearly 400 wickets for India. Mohammed Shami has got close to 500 wickets for India. 400-450 wickets, you know, these are the big numbers. I’m talking about all formats, including all formats. You know, he’s there as far as the fast bowlers are concerned when it comes to the great Kapil Dev, Javagal Srinath, Zaheer Khan.
I stayed at 300 wickets. If I didn’t have injuries, I could have gone to 500 wickets. So can we have someone who has a quality to get, you know, 400 wickets, 500 wickets for team India? So we need to start preparing now. If we don’t do that, and if we think that we have options and we’ll be fine, we’ll be in trouble. Luckily, the National Cricket Academy has a good setup. So obviously they’re going to be thinking about it with the help of the BCCI and, you know, coming together as a team. VVS Laxman at the helm of NCA. I think he’s very smart. And obviously he’s already thinking about it, but we have to make sure that we get good quality fast bowlers. Every single year, at least five or six quality options, this is where we’re going to grow as a cricket. Like Australia used to dominate. Australia dominated in the 2000s crazily, they used to win every trophy everywhere we went. Now that we have won the T20 World Cup, I hope that, you know, we continue that. But for that, we need to have a solid pace battery available all the time.
So, I’m going to talk about how we go ahead from here but, very quickly, is the competition improving standards, because there’s so much competition amongst Indian bowlers themselves. And the other is, corollary to that is, there’s so much we hear about workload management. So you, personally, as a bowler who’s played at the international level for many years, a bowler that is at a peak Jasprit Bumrah or Shami, and then you say, workload management, usse thoda rest de dete hai. How does that work? Do you, you know, in the old days, the wisdom was, you keep playing, the more you play, the better you get.
So I think with that data and, you know, the bowler’s own feeling is very important. Data is one thing that they’ll give you red flags, in terms of how many… how the data works in terms of bowling. So there is a trainer and the physio. They keep monitoring how many overs you have bowled throughout the whole year and they see about the spike. So how does injury happen generally? Suppose if you have an off season for two months and you haven’t bowled and suddenly you are coming and playing a high level series like Australia. If you’re playing five test matches and you haven’t bowled for two months, you come slightly under prepared as far as the matches are concerned. Not so much in the nets. Nets are very different. When you bowl in the nets, you maybe have an effort of 90 percent, 85 percent, but in the matches it goes beyond 100 percent effort. So suddenly that jump of 10, 15 percent gives you injury. And that happens at the start of the season generally. Once you have played matches, your body is on auto mode. But this (start of season) is where you need to make sure you don’t jump from second floor to fifth floor, you need to go step by step. First floor, second floor, third floor, fourth floor. If you go from the first floor to the fifth floor, as far as the jump is concerned, you will get injured. Similarly, if you’re bowling 10 overs and suddenly you’re going to be bowling 20 overs a day, that’s a big jump. So as far as the big jump is concerned, with the help of data, you need to avoid it. But if you say: I’ll see what happens, I’ll bowl 20 overs… that cannot happen. You cannot stop and start. You need to gradually build up as a fast bowler. If you keep doing that, you will have less injury. Personally, I had a lot of injuries. I used to feel like that I’m a mummy like the ones in the museum, literally, because I used to have tape all around the body.
I had a toe fracture, I had a left knee fracture, I had a left knee meniscus problem, I had a right knee patella problem, I had right knee cartilage damage — 50 percent. I had hamstring injuries 15 times. I had quad injuries quite a few times. I had side strains many times. I had L3, L4, L5 fractures on the right and left. I had a disc prolapse, I had a hip fracture, I had a scapula issue, and I had C6 and C7 issues. So, I had many injuries. The problem with my injuries, I don’t know how many doctors are here… Doctorsaab, you know, I’m a half doctor as well. So, problem with me, by the time I realised after those injuries, and when NCA got better and a lot of great physios started coming in, that’s when I realised and the physios realised that I had vitamin D deficiency. And that is why I had a lot of bone issues. And my issue was that even if I had little issues, I used to play. Like I played with fractures.
I played with my back fracture because I used to go to the MRI scans in Mumbai, Baroda, at that time. I’m talking about 2009-ish. No scan. At that time, we had only 1.5 Tesla MRI machines, three Tesla abhi tak aaya nahi tha. Aur wahape slices ki kami hojati hai. Usme sirf yahi dikhayi de raha tha ki degenerative changes hai. So I said, okay, degenerative changes is normal because I’m playing a lot of cricket. So I used to get a lot of pain. I would eat painkillers every day. And this is where my pace went down. A lot of people actually started talking about how my pace went down because I played with fractures. If you have a fracture, you can’t move. But I used to play with the fracture. Obviously, the pace is going to go down. So if I had better management as far as the injury is concerned, I would have probably had a longer career. I would have had a better career. My pace would have been sustained for a very long period of time. Luckily, I still play. But in terms of answering your questions, if you manage both the things where you need to bowl enough, you need to take help of data and then make a nice balance and then keep moving forward, then you’ll have less injuries.
So, you’ve been closely associated now with your commentary assignments, they take you very close to the action, you’re meeting the players, the coaches. Do you think that now there is a more scientific approach? Is that happening? And is there resistance from the players ki yaar ye sab kya karwa rahe ho humse?
Things are getting much better as far as the physios are concerned, we have a lot of great Indian physios now. Outstanding Indian physios, and I love that about our Indian cricket now. Because a lot of physios came from abroad, probably they didn’t understand our mindset. That was one thing, one negative thing. But now our local physio understands our language, understands our emotions, understands our body as well, because our body, compared to Australian’s body mass and the bone mass is different. Our food is different as well, on a day-to-day basis. So, you know, that culture is different as well. So if you have a physio who understands everything, that helps, so we have that now. In NCA as well, we have those kinds of physios. With the Indian team, we have those kinds of physios as well. My own physio, Ashish Kaushik, who was there with the National Cricket Academy for nearly 10 years. He was Indian as well. He was there with the Indian team for one and a half years. So with that, it does add value. But now the onus is on the player. The problem with nowadays players is that sometimes they hide behind the data. They hide behind the data and they don’t want to bowl enough. Probably they want to save themselves. It’s not their fault as well. But they want to save themselves. But if you save yourself too much and not bowl enough, according to the format you are playing, you will have a lot of issues and a lot of injuries. So things are getting better as far as Indian cricket is concerned, the physios are concerned, but the onus lies on the player.
Maybe internal competition will help people not hide behind data, because for each place in the Indian team today, there are four, five, six players vying for that place. So hopefully, that competition will keep everybody on their toes.
It’s about the attitude as well, right? As I said earlier, the competition does help. There are a lot of players who don’t want to play red ball cricket now. But, and this is about attitude, right, and look at Jasprit Bumrah. Why do I love that guy so much? I think he’s the best of our generation, probably the best we ever had as far as quality fast bowling is concerned. But look at his attitude. He had a back surgery. I have seen a lot of guys who had minute injuries and they don’t want to play red ball cricket. They don’t want to represent India in Test cricket. But this guy, Jasprit Bumrah, gives priority to test cricket in the generations where everyone wants to be playing white ball cricket, T20 cricket. But Jasprit Bumrah always wants to take Test cricket forward. And he bowls a lot of overs.
I saw myself being on the ground in the South African test series. The Test matches lasted only two days. But in those two days, he had to bowl two innings, right? He was giving each and every ball the same effort. So he was actually walking the talk, whatever he said that I want to give priority to test cricket and priority to red ball cricket. And that is why I’m a huge fan of him. So that comes down to his own attitude. If Jasprit Bumrah says tomorrow that I don’t want to play red ball cricket, no one’s going to say anything to him. We’ll say, OK, we’ll look after you. And we want to see you play white ball cricket, T20 World Cup, 50 over World Cup, and we’ll be fine. We’ll be more than happy. But that guy says, no, I want to play the old format. Doesn’t matter if I had surgery. Because I love playing for India, I love playing test cricket, and give priority to the kind of 5-day cricket, where does it come from? It comes from within. So that is why a lot of guys stay behind. This guy is actually going forward.
That’s why he’s a once in a generation cricketer. So, Irfan, right now, as we talk, I mean, we’ve just had the World T20, which we won. The next four years, we’ve got the World Test Championship final coming up. Hopefully, India will be there. In fact, I’m convinced India will be there in the final. Champions trophy, then the World Cup will be played in India in 2026. Then there’s the 2027 ODI World Cup. And after that, in 2028, cricket will be in the Olympics. So there’s a four-year blueprint. If I have to ask you, what should be our four-year blueprint? We also had a change in the T20 captaincy. Now we’ve got Surya Kumar as the captain. Rohit is going to be captain for the tests and ODI’s. Is that right, different captains for different formats or different ball colours? Is that the right way to go?
So, my thinking has always been that we like stability as far as our culture is concerned. We like stability, right? That is why Rohit Sharma was the captain of T20 cricket as well because the 50 over World Cup was just in between the six months, there was only six months’ time. So, because of the stability, I think we were able to perform better under Rohit Sharma as far as the captaincy is concerned. Imagine, we had a different captain in the 50 over World Cup and then T20 World Cup, kya humein same result milta? Kyunki last ke 30 balls me aapko sirf 30 runs chahiye, koi bhi team jeet jaati thi. South Africa jeet jaati thi.
But Rohit was very calm. Obviously, credit to Hardik the way he bowled, credit to Jasbir Bumrah the way he bowled, credit to all the bowlers they hold their nerves, credit to Surya Kumar Yadav, the way he held his nerve to get that one of the greatest catches in our Indian cricket history. So, you know, there are a lot of right things happening at the right time, but that calmness comes from the leader as well. So that calmness of Rohit Sharma helped and because he is all three format captain, that helps the player as well. And we actually follow the lead very, very well. You know, we Indians are very good at following our leaders.
So when it comes to having different captains in different formats, I have my doubts. I might be wrong. I hope I’m wrong for the sake of Indian cricket, you know, because I think whatever I’ve seen so far now, that this is what’s going to happen. We’ll have different captains for different formats. I don’t totally agree with it, though.
No, no, it’s a great point of view. I feel that the way we are built, if there’s one guy kind-of not calling the shots, put in charge, continuity, and then therefore there is less chances of disruption. Before I open it for the house, I just wanted you to explain, I keep writing about it often enough that the Indian cricket dressing room is a microcosm of Indian life. From all sections of society, people come from all denominations, religious denominations, class, caste, creed, etc. So, what is it like in the Indian dressing room? You know, if you see the history there were disputes, parochialism, but that is in the last 20, 25, 30 years at least one sees great stability, and therefore it’s, I think, translating into better and better performances. Am I right in making that observation?
I’d like to share a short story of my first match in Adelaide, it was my debut in 2003. You’re talking about dressing room atmosphere, right? What happens? It’s a great place to be. I was so lucky that I was sharing a dressing room with the greatest name in the world called Sachin Tendulkar. I was actually very lucky, I did share a dressing room with him for close to 10 years. And I’m lucky to actually have a kind of relationship now after cricket. Actually our relationship got even better because we played Legends League cricket together. Now we live only a few kilometres apart. So, I feel great privilege to actually have that kind of relationship and rapport with the great Sachin Tendulkar.
But when I played that first game in Adelaide, we won that game after 21 years in Australia. For 21 years, we had not won a game in Australia. So, it was a huge thing. I only got one wicket. I got Matthew Hayden’s wicket. Second wicket could have been Ricky Ponting’s wicket. He scored 200. He was batting on 9 or 10. Sehwag dropped the catch. I was bowling an outswinger. Made a plan perfectly but he was dropped and he scored 200.
But the way we came back in Ajit Agarkar’s special marvellous spell, came in the second and he got six wickets. Rahul Dravid’s score runs, VVS Laxman’s score runs. In that particular game, the way we came back and won the game, I only got one wicket but I used to think we won it because of me. Because I’m lucky. So I used to feel very proud. My first game, India won.
So, after winning the game in the Adelaide dressing room, I was just going back to the dressing room. I was so happy. I was just taking the whole atmosphere in. And Zaheer knew me. Zaheer and I played a lot of cricket together in Baroda as well. Zaheer knew that I don’t drink. So Zaheer said to other cricketers (and this is the only time when we won), he said, okay, at least we’ll open the champagne bottle in the dressing room and we’ll celebrate this victory. So, I got very scared. I thought, now Zaheer is telling everyone that I don’t drink and I have to drink today because now it’s a celebration time. We have to somehow make Irfan drink the champagne. I was 19 years old. I was very young. At 19, you are usually studying and you are away from what is happening in the world. What I did is I went out of the dressing room and in the corner somewhere I was hiding. And I was like, I’ll not drink alcohol. So, I was very rigid in my head that this absolutely has to be this way. And I was very scared as well. This is the Indian dressing room. What will Sachin Tendulkar think? What will Rahul Dravid think? What will Sourav Ganguly think? So all the thoughts were going in my head because I was scared. Suddenly the voice came.
It was Sachin Tendulkar’s voice. Sachin paaji came to me because everyone was looking, so Sachin paaji knew that I’m standing in the corner outside the dressing room. He said, come here, come here. And I said, yes, paaji. He said, do you just try to show that you don’t drink or you have belief that’s why you don’t drink? I said, yeah, I follow that and I don’t drink. He said, okay. He put his hand on my shoulder. He said, no one’s going to touch you. You stay in the dressing room and celebrate with us. You’re not going to drink and no one’s going to force you to drink.
That’s the kind of value system we have in our dressing room. And I was like, wow. I went into the dressing room and suddenly from my first game I felt like this is my dressing room. You know, I’m part of this family. And that family stayed as long as I played for Indian cricket. Luckily, we had those kinds of characters in our dressing room. So when you asked what kind of atmosphere we have in the dressing room, we have a lot of funny guys as well in the dressing room, like Yuvraj Singh, Harbhajan Singh, who can play pranks on the Captain also. And we have quite a few simple guys like VVS Laxman who used to take naps before going to the ground. We used to call him Sai Baba. He was such a simple guy. He used to take a shower before going to bat. And coming back also he used to take a shower.
We had guys like Rahul Dravid, who used to advise us on how to be good humans as well. I remember in Australia only when I played my first series, and suddenly by the time I played One Day cricket in Melbourne, I remember I was having an ice bath. He came to me. Suddenly, he saw that no one was there. He had wanted to actually speak to me for quite a few days because when I suddenly, you know, with that curly hair and as a 19-year-old boy, I had a lot of female fan following at that particular time. So, Rahul Dravid noticed that. And the series was about to end. He said, Irfan, how is it going? I said, yeah, everything is fine. He said, I have one piece of advice for you. I said, Yes, Rahul bhai, please. He said, kabhi kisi ladki ko jhooth mat bolna. I don’t know where it is going, right? I was like, what are you trying to say? He said, no, no, no.
Just want to say, whatever you do in your life, you’ll have a journey ahead. You will become a really successful cricketer. You’ll achieve a lot many things as well. Hopefully going forward, you might even win the World Cup, but never lie to any female. And he left. Now it left me thinking, took me a while to understand what he was saying – no matter what you do, never lie. So that actually stuck with me for a long period of time. So we had different kinds of characters and I was so lucky that I had those kinds of seniors who taught me not just how to be a really good cricketer, but at least try to be a good human being. That is the most important thing.
So I thought this was very important to understand what is the flavour of the Indian dressing room. We all are cricket followers.
And one last thing. Aisa nahi tha ki fights nahi thhey. There were fights, arguments and everything, but when it came to playing for India, we were just crazy. We were one. You know, no matter where we came from, North, South, Central, East, West, it didn’t matter. We fought together. I remember having a fight with one of the seniors, probably in the dressing room, and the next day, he was actually diving around on my bowling, and he had a brilliant catch in one of the games as well. So we were crazy when it came to playing for India.
ROTARIANS ASK
That was really, really entertaining and very informative. Thank you so much, Irfan. You played under various captains and also watched succeeding captains. So, of the four, Sourav Ganguly, MS Dhoni, Rohit Sharma, and of course, before that, Virat Kohli – who do you rate the best?
Unfortunately, I didn’t play under Virat Kohli’s captaincy. Unfortunately, I didn’t play under Rohit Sharma’s captaincy. And I regret that. Because I really believe that both the captains had different traits. I’ve seen Virat fighting for his players like crazy. He backed his players. He went out on social media, in front of the press. And he said, OK, I’m going to back this guy. No matter whatever you want to do, you do it. Rohit Sharma is the same. He’s got a heart. He values bowlers. And actually, I’ve always said that in my commentary as well. Rohit Sharma is the bowler’s captain. Being a batsman, also, he understands the value and the pain of the bowlers, which is very important. And that is why he’s been able to be so successful in IPL with the Indian team as well. Imagine if he had WTC under his name. Imagine he had a 50 over World Cup under his name. He would have been as great as Mahendra Singh Dhoni as far as the captaincy is concerned. And now, talking about the leader’s name you took, pehla pyaar apko pata hai na? Pehla pyaar special hota hai. So my pehla pyaar, pehla captain is Sourav Ganguly. So, he’s always going to be special.
You know, when I played my first game in Adelaide, one day before, before going to the field, he said, Irfan, you’ll bowl first change. That was one day before. But as soon as I went inside the field, he said, you’ll bowl first. So basically, he played those sorts of games. You know, because he knew I’m a youngster. I can’t think too much before playing the test matches. So he gave me a surprise new ball. Okay, now you bowl. So he handled me that way. He used to handle certain players in a certain way. He had a great fighting spirit and great qualities as a leader. Dhoni was very sharp. See, Dhoni, we call him mastermind because he kept things very, very simple under pressure. That’s what made him really special. See, when you have pressure, you complicate things. Dhoni didn’t do that, he kept it simple. And he had a nice theory about it as well. So that’s what made him a really great captain.
But for me, if I had to choose the number one captain, I’d choose Sourav Ganguly, purely because Pehla Pyaar, as I said. But no one can come close to Dhoni when it comes to winning trophies. Two other captains who were slightly underrated and a lot of people don’t talk about their leadership is, Rahul Dravid and Anil Kumble. Unfortunately, we didn’t have great Anil Kumble’s leadership services for a long period of time. Unfortunately, we didn’t have any. You know, because, by the time he became a senior, Sourav Ganguly was leading the side and then he was playing under Mohammad Azharuddin. And then obviously by the time Rahul Dravid became captain as well, then Sehwag was Vice captain for a certain period of time. So Kumble’s leadership services were not taken into consideration for a very long period of time. If Anil Kumble had not been the captain in Australia, you know, with the whole MonkeyGate saga, we would have been coming back home, leaving the Australia series. But the way he managed the whole tournament, because of him, we were able to stay back. We fought, we actually held our integrity as Indian cricketers because of him. And the way we fought back, and won the match in Perth, where I had the privilege to be part of that game and to be able to actually get the man of the match trophy, it’s just because of the solid quality of Anil Kumble. So, these two guys are very underrated. Unfortunately, they didn’t have a longer time as far as the leadership is concerned. So, number one, Sourav Ganguly, number two, Mahendra Singh Dhoni, but don’t forget Rahul Dravid and Anil Kumble as well.
Thank you.
Sir, there was an instance in one of the matches, if I’m not wrong, it was against South Africa, where you and your brother were in front of… you all were batting. And if I’m not wrong, by taking a run, he got you run out. So we just want to hear about that incident.
Ayaz: You know, it’s his turn to bully his brother now. This was in the Legends match.
Yeah, just recently in England. So the match was actually badly stuck. To win the game, we needed to score 200; to qualify, we needed to score 154. By the time I went to bat, Yuvi, as a captain, had strict instructions for me to aim for 154, because we need to qualify now. Because four wickets were down, the run rate to score 200 was about 13-14. And the run rate to score 154 was about eight. Then slowly, slowly, when we built a partnership, it went to nine or 10. And then we had a partnership and by the time we were about 20 runs short or something, this incident happened, the incident you’re talking about. So I hit the shot. First ball went into the air behind the covers. And I thought a second run was there. But my brother decided, no, it’s not there. But how he decided, he took two steps. See, abhi kya hai na, we are 40 now. We are not 20. So, if you take two steps forward, that means you need to run. So, I thought he’s running. And so he took those two or three steps and then he said, no, after running those two-three steps. By that time, I took off. There was no turning back for me. And I knew that now I’m gone. And I always believe that if me and my brother are playing, I will always sacrifice my wicket than my brother’s. Because I think, obviously, he’s the elder brother. But he’s got a great ability to finish the game as well.
And that is why he’s been such a successful T20 cricketer as well. Won three trophies. The first IPL trophy he won as well. T20 World Cup he was part of. And then he was part of the 50 over World Cup as well. So, he was a big, big match player. So I said, OK, I got run out. But then because we wanted to finish the game, look, we might be retired, but we have that passion to play for India. We don’t want to lose. We want to make sure that we win every time we go on the field. And if you don’t have passion, don’t play. You’d rather be at home and watch the games. For us, it is very important. So that emotion took over. And I told my brother, arre pehle bolna bhai, why didn’t you tell me before? And you would have said, no, I would have stayed back.
So I was actually watching when one of our friends came home yesterday. And he was actually showing me that video. And I laughed so much. So my brother had this reaction. And then I realised, oh, shit, mera bhai toh hai, lekin abhi MP bhi hai. Yeah, I’m going to play a politician. So I need to behave. So I went back. I was angry. I calmed down, I said, Ek toh main chota bhai, upar se maine daant diya mere bade bhai ko, ab kya kare? I said, let’s do something. So he finished the game. And so my plan became very clear that when he’ll come, I’ll kiss him. I’ll straight away kiss him and hug him. And I’ll say sorry in a way that he knows. I went to hug him. I kissed him. And then we cleared it there and there. Said sorry for saying things and he also said, haan yaar, main bhi tumko manaa kar sakta tha. We hugged and we moved forward.
So, what are your views on Rotaract clubs of Mumbai?
So far, when I see the Club and when I hear the amazing stories of the work in terms of education, in terms of helping out a lot of needy as well, I feel very privileged to be here because I believe in giving back. If you just take all the time, you’re not going to grow. The only time you grow as a human is when you give back and I think Rotary Club gives back to society big time.
So I really think very highly of the club and I really wish and believe that you guys keep continuing the great work that you guys are doing.
Just a couple of things I’d like to know from you, the inside story. For instance, before an inning starts, you know, you all huddle together. What do you talk about in that huddle? That’s one.
Two, when you – in between wickets when you’re taking runs, sometimes I see the batsmen and the non-striker, they get together in the middle and you say something. Are you cracking jokes about the others, guys around?
And finally, are you still following Rahul Dravid’s advice?
Now I follow my wife’s advice so that’s even better.
So, in the huddle, it’s very interesting because a lot of our Indian cricket fans have this question about what exactly we talk. There are great lines, like Virat Kohli said for the next 60 overs they should feel like it’s hell. Make sure you bowl like that and they won the test match at the Lords. So that was in the huddle when Virat Kohli said that. But there was a time as well where hum log ko as a team jab team khadi hai, Captain ne bamboo diya hai. Buri tarah se. I remember a match in Kanpur and Dhoni called everyone as soon as the over was over, it was not a drinks break. We were playing a match against Pakistan and it was tense. Misbah-ul-Haq was batting and the 2-3 boys were short on efforts, and Dhoni saw that. So he called a huddle, for five minutes, which is a long time. It’s more than an over time. Usne match rok diya aur sabko bamboo diye, literally galiyan di hai. He was so pissed.
So this too happens in a huddle, when it’s important to remind the players that we are playing for India and we can’t give up like this. And many times aisa bhi hua hai ki, ha bhaai, girlfriend theek hai? Itna bolke aage chale gaye. Because there are times, genuinely, you don’t have anything to say in the huddle. You just want everyone to come together. The main purpose of the huddle is to make the chain with your teammates’ arms around the shoulders and pass the energy that you are playing for India. But it can’t always be inspirational. Many times, the Captain won’t say anything, he will ask the youngest player to put forth his views. He would speak up his mind for 30 seconds, sometimes seniors would speak. Sometimes if there is nothing to say, one would crack a joke and we leave. That is why you can see boys laughing in some games after the huddle.
This was very good. I really enjoyed it, but there were some three lessons that I learned and I’m sure many people did. One was about stability. One was about attitude, which I think is very important. And one was about duty. These were the three things that hit me. So what do you think about the current generation of cricketers, are they carrying the same values that you all have grown up with and you are giving it to them now? Because this is tacit learning and it’s very difficult to pick up.
So kind of you, thank you for nice words. So the mindset of this current generation has changed. And that’s a reality. And as an ex-cricketer, we have to accept it. And we have to get that mindset accordingly. What happened when we saw old cricketers? We used to always feel that they have some sort of bitterness towards us. We used to feel that. I’m not saying that’s the right thing. Because what happened is that I have seen money grow in Indian cricket. In 2008, IPL started. And it changed Indian cricket and it changed a lot of Indian cricketers as well, as far as the financial stability is concerned. But before that, all the great cricketers who played for India, they didn’t have that much financial stability. Then the stability came. And I tell this to our cricketers, who played cricket with me. I think there will be a time in the next five years, next 10 years. You’ll see in the auction, a lot of cricketers will go for Rs 50 crore. And I’m not just saying it just like that, we’ve seen Rs 25 crore barriers crossed at the last auction already. So I’m not saying something unrealistic. That will happen. And by the time when we played IPL, the highest was about Rs 8 crores, Rs 10 crores. It was that kind of barrier there. So barriers in terms of financials will keep changing. And the mindset with that will keep changing as well.
I’ll tell you a small, simple thing in terms of giving back, as you asked as well. I work, and that is my big flex. As far as my own flex is concerned, I don’t talk about it in the media. And I don’t want anyone to record this as well. I work with a lot of cricketers who are on the fringe of playing for India. And they are away from the Indian team, but they want to come back. And they don’t have anywhere to go. And when they contact me, I try to help them. I don’t even think about it, because I think that’s my way of giving back to Indian cricket, not even to them, to Indian cricket. And I work hard with them. And there are quite a few cricketers who I work with. And I work quietly as well. And I tell them specifically, don’t use my name. Don’t use my name. Don’t tell them you’re working with me. You just take advantage of me, and you grow. And that’s enough for me. But because I know the kind of attitude now the younger cricketers have, they want to actually take you as a stepping stone, and they want to move forward. And that’s the clear mindset. It’s a very professional mindset they have. That’s the unfortunate mindset they have. They learn. By the time they learn, they become 35, 40. And it’s too late. I don’t even expect hello from them. And I keep telling me and myself, as well as my wife, that I don’t expect anything from them. So for me, it’s important to give them back, give Indian cricket something by helping these guys who are there on the fringe.
And even with the Indian team, if I feel that someone is struggling, especially a bowler, if he’s struggling with a technique or some issues, because I am regularly attached to commentary. I watch matches. And I have my own vision. I do a lot of courses, as well, as far as the coaching courses are concerned. I go to NCA quietly. I spent two weeks there. And I learn nuances of details of the technique. So I call some of the guys directly who needed help. And I speak to them. I share my experience, and I move forward. But for guys like us, it is important to give back, but make sure not to expect anything from them, because you’ll only get hurt. So you help them and move forward.