There is a perennial debate about the captain’s role in winning cricket matches. Are captains are really important in changing the fortunes of the team? If you analyse the previous world cups, it is difficult to under estimate the captain’s role. 1. Who can forget Imran Khan’s inspiring captaincy in 1992 cricket world cup?  2. Who can forget Steve Waugh’s never dyeing spirit in 1999 world cup?  3. Who can forget Kapildev’s words before the West Indies Batting in 1983 world cup finals?  4. Who can forget Arjun Ranatunga’s imaginative captaincy in 1996 cricket world cup?  5. Who can forget Clive Lloyd’s wonderful batting in the finals of the 1975 world cup?  6. Who can forget the Martin Crowe’s tactics in the 1992 world cup?  7. Who can forget Allan Border’s role in winning the 1987 world cup?  8. Who can forget Ricky Ponting century in the finals of the 2003 world cup? If you recall above scenes, no one can under estimate the Captian’s role in winning world cup.An inspiring captain can able to achieve superlative performances from team members. Some captains like Ranatunga and Ponting may be proactive while Lloyd and Border may be diminutive in their style of functioning; they all successfully extracted wonderful performances from their team members. One common quality in all successful captains is they protected team members in crisis situations. 1. Ranatunga protected Muralitharan in crucial times while Imran Khan stood behind Inzamam in 1992 world cup. In 2007 cricket world cup, we already saw the inspiring captaincy from West Indies captain Brian Lara. He encouraged youngsters and stood by them even in failures. They repaid the captian’s faith by showing superb performance against Pakistan. We have to wait and see the performances from other captains before giving judgement.   … [Read more...]