Raina: a role model for his young mates

Newspaper :During India's victorious campaign in the VB Tri-series in Australia, SuresNews Paperh Raina kept waiting for his elusive chance. Throughout optimistic for his opportunity, Raina was also a realist on that tour. He knew that Mumbai's prodigy Rohit Sharma had taken over a lead in the battle on India's new generation of batsmen. After playing some dazzling half-centuries on that tour, Rohit became the cynosure of the Richie Benauds and Ian Chappels, who hailed him as the next Tendulkar.

Six months later, Raina made an instant impact in the Asia cup by scoring two hundreds and two fifties. And since then he never looked back. He became a permanent fixture in Dhoni's One-day squad. Contrastingly, as Raina's career was on the ascendancy, Rohit's fortune was flagging. So much so that in the next two years, Raina was aksed to lead the Indian side in the absence of Dhoni, while Rohit was desperate to revive his ODI career.And, now as luck would have it, Raina who was not considered good enough for the Board President's XI against South Africa this year, scored a debut hundred in Colombo against Sri Lanka.

Although it is a bit preposterous to compare Raina to India's greatest left-hand batsman Sourav Ganguly, it is, however tempting not to rule out the striking similarities in both players' characteristics. Despite scoring in England,Australia , South Africa and West Indies, Ganguly could never remove the label of being "supect against short-stuff". But, Ganguly's success at the international level also proved that there is more to cricket than merely looking graceful while handling short balls. Raina will be a wise man to spend a few days in his former captain's company. Raina exhibits Sourav's stubbornness (though he is not as demonstrative) and an exceptional desire to succeed at the highest level no matter what the critics say.

"Sourav was destiny's child. He got his chance because Siddhu and Manjrekar didn't play at the Lord's for various reasons in 1996. Since making his debut hundred, Dada never looked back. In some strange coincident, Raina got his lucky breakthrough because Yuvi was injured. I am not taking anything away from his innings but god has given him a wonderful start. Muralitharan just retired and Malinga didn't play. And, of course SSC was not as challenging as Galle," remarked former India spinner Maninder Singh.

It's a fact that since the 2007 world cup, besides Gautam Gambhir, Raina is the only batsman who has cemented his place in the ODI side. Close to his century appearance (he has played 98 to be precise) in ODI cricket, Raina got his chance in Test cricket due to the last-minute withdrawal by one of his idols Yuvraj Singh.

In the past, by his own admission, Maninder has been one of Raina's fiercest critics. Acknowledging the initial and some obvious similarities with Sourav, Maninder has a word for the UP captain. "Raina doesn't have the same ladaku (fighting spirit) like Dada but he can cultivate it. Or maybe he has, but is not as demonstrative like Sourav."

During IPL - 2 in South Africa, one remembers a pleasant afternoon meal with Raina in Durban just after interviewing one of his Chennai Super King's mates, Matthew Hayden. Hayden has just professed about Raina's future.

"I think he is an exceptionally young talent. And he has a great head on his shoulders as well. He is putting himself in a position where he is able to score runs in not just the Twenty20 version of the game but in all formats. I think his stars are shinning bright and they will do so for a long time to come. I think he is ready for Test cricket."

One immediately sought Raina's reaction on the former Australian opener's observation.

"If somebody asked me if I could swap my 100 T-20 games for 10 Test matches, I would happily do that." Such was Raina’s desperation to succeed in the five-day format.

Hayden is not the first Australian to be impressed by Raina's talent. Team India's former coach and another Australian giant Greg Chappel was mesmerised by Raina's obvious talent. Chappel is even accused of giving Raina too many opportunities when he was India's coach. When Raina made a spectacular half century against the visiting English side in 2006, Graham Gooch saw the glimpses of a great career and even went on to say that Raina reminded him of a young Tendulkar. In Indian cricket, even sincere praise can became your enemy and the the southpaw soon discovered it quite painfully. Just a solitary half-century in the last 20 matches leading to the Caribbean world cup saw Raina dropped from Indian team. Raina's coach Deepak Shrama was one of the few people who were always there for him regardless of his failures or success.

"He is one of the rarest talents. Even during that crisis which would have broken a young spirit, I didn't have to give him a pep-talk to lift him. He was self-motivated. He never complained nor cribbed for being dropped. Almost monkish in his approach as far as his cricket is concerned," says Sharma.

Raina is a left hander but Rahul Dravid has been one of the batsmen he has always looked up to. Raina got his Test cap by his former captain and didn't disappoint him by getting a debut ton (something Dravid missed by a whisker at the Lord's in the same Test where Sourav got his hundred).

In the last one-and-half decade, only two players have got debut hundred in Test cricket. Both have cemented their place in India's as well in the world's cricket history with their remarkable achievements. And Raina will be more than happy to follow in the footsteps of Sourav Ganguly and Virender Sehwag. Source:
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