Introducing the 17th man of Indian cricket – the son of an influential father and the misfit of the locker room | Cricket News

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— Hanuma Vihari (@Hanumavihari) February 26, 2024

In a sport that requires 11 players on the field and about 15 on a team, drafting additional extras is not necessarily a contingency plan conceived by overcautious administrators. yeah. In most cases, giving unwanted and unsolicited extra hands to a team is the evil act of a compromised administrator.

The profiling of the 17th Ranji Trophy player gives an idea about the corruption in the selection process and also explains the intricacies of the state-wise administration of cricket. In most cases, these “special extras” are the sons of influential and dissolute fathers. They feel a kind of apologetic feeling when they're with people who have rightfully earned their first-class caps because deep down they know they don't deserve to be there. If you look at them with suspicion, they are outsiders who are not involved in the team.

Arguably the most talked about player in Indian cricket, the 17th player is Lalu's son Tejashwi Yadav, who is currently a Bihar chief minister aspirant. The former cricketer has a record of spending quality time in the dugout of both Team India and the IPL. This was a time when his father was the railway minister and a member of the BCCI.

As a junior, Tejashwi was part of a special group of five junior cricketers who teamed up with India's main team in the 2008 U-19 World Cup in Malaysia. According to the official explanation, the five were on an international exposure trip. It was the first time that an Indian board had undertaken such an initiative, which was subsequently discontinued. He then warmed the bench of IPL team Delhi Daredevils for nearly five years without playing a single match. Delhi was in the midst of trading Gautam Gambhir, Daniel Vettori, Tillakaratne Dilshan and AB de Villiers, but their faith in their 17th player remained unwavering.

Pakistan has a name for those who invade its cricket turf. They are called palkis, which literally means paper checks. What is being referred to is the recommendation slip containing the name of the illegitimate cricketer, which the selectors bring to the meeting and urge them to field the player. India also shares this tradition.

The old hands associated with cricket in Delhi and Uttar Pradesh give an idea about the people who have the power to pull the strings from the background. “The people who always call me are politicians who are promoting someone from their own ward, mafia dons who think their relative is the next Tendulkar, bureaucrats who have unwarranted confidence in their son's bowling skills, and people who are always calling me to get their way. A former player who has used his old connections to make a difference, or a businessman who is ready to finance a child's sports dreams. In some cases, it is impossible to ignore such requests,” he said. He explained how deals are stalled and quid pro quo terms negotiated.

But over the years, cunning state administrators have figured out how to impose obligations on influential people without compromising the strength of active players. They made the captains and coaches understand that they could pick the best 12 or 13 of their choice and could not turn a blind eye to the rest of the team outside of the top spots.

As a result, a strange situation arose. The same thing happened a long time ago when a police officer suddenly came to my dressing room in Uttar Pradesh. “At first everyone thought he was part of the security guard or something, but he Bari Sifarisi (Highly Recommended) Player. He also played the game,” recalls a former player.

This trend extends to the IPL as well, where franchise teams with a corporate structure are believed to be wired to work on meritocratic principles. But team owners have various business interests, so they, too, couldn't cut off calls from Babas and politicians. They, too, found a middle path. A close look at the expedition reveals a small group of players wearing team jerseys and carrying official kit bags, who do not play in matches but are used as net bowlers.

Some of the players ranked 17th are ambitious. Once they join the Jumbo team, some of them will also be in charge of answering phones and will be selected as national team players. A former captain of the domestic team said there was a mad scramble among “special extras” to join the squad for games against generally weaker teams. “If the game is against a team from the Northeast, these additional players will be asked to participate,” he says.

A few seasons ago, Bihar made eight changes for the match against Arunachal Pradesh. Sixty-two players represented the state that year, but selection committee members complained of receiving “frequent requests to accommodate relatives of bureaucrats, politicians, and businessmen.”

In a bizarre incident last season, one of the players, number 17, was told on the eve of a match that he would not be included due to a number of injuries in the squad. To everyone's surprise, he refused, saying he was not ready.

“He knew the match was going to be played on a patched pitch with bounce, so there was reluctance. The next thing I knew, the politicians who were pushing for him to come on… There were calls begging him not to play as it would jeopardize his career,” said a regular on the domestic circuit.

Things will seem easy for someone who has an influential father or godfather on speed dial. They can choose their game and become first-class cricketers without any hard work or talent. But not everything is rosy. They can be part of the euphoric dressing room, but they can't share the adrenaline rush of their peers. They can wear team jerseys but cannot be part of the men's team. They also do not understand the spirit of Kipling's famous law of the jungle: “The strength of the pack is the wolf, and the strength of the wolf is the pack.” There's nothing worse than being lonely when playing a team sport.

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