Lessons from Cricket ON and OFF the Field | Karthik Jeshwanth | Former Indian First-Class Cricketer

Karthik Jeshwanth (Guest): Thank you

Karthik Jeshwanth (Guest): My belief is that every child has a right towards sport, not necessarily cricket in any sport and you may ask why?

Sports develop character, sports develop personality and the last, and the most important thing which a sport can do is make a person fitter for the rest of his life. Imagine when a child takes up sport.

The one guaranteed thing, which he or she will take away from sport, whether they make it big in sport or bigger career in sport or not. The one thing, one takeaway would be that fitness culture, which is a must for a sport for most sport.

Once after your sport, you continue with this fitness culture, the entire population is fit and in any adversity towards the country, it is always better to have a fit population where compared to an unfit or a sick population.

This is one takeaway for the country in itself. I know our Prime Minister and India in as such, currently from the last 10, 15 years are giving a lot of importance towards sport for all sports.

That's a very good thing, and that's where we are seeing our performance at the world level, also in the Olympics and all that and we are planning to host the Olympics in 2036. Let's see how we progress towards that for the first time with lot of dreams and aspirations, they do get into the academy where rightly so, which all of us have done that, when we got into the sport. But we all reached our own levels.

Like destiny or your talent takes you to the levels where you deserve to be. You'll not get more or you'll not get less because it evens out. Coming to that, the change when we were playing or when I was playing, probably. I know that you're a lot younger than me. When I was playing, we just played for the love of the game and we didn't know that where it's going to take us, and we ended up wherever.

But currently what is happening is everybody who comes into the sport thinks that it's very easy, and especially the parents, as you know, that the disposable income of Indians have risen a bit now. Everybody thinks that sending their children to a particular sport and expecting them to reach the big, the real tops there.

It  is not that let me explore how good I am at this and let me reach the end which I deserve to be, versus I when I pick up a bat, I would like to be a Virat Kohli or Tendulkar a a Suryavanshi, or iquickly, if I don't belong there. I need to become a Sundar Pichai or a Satya Nadella, so this patience part, or trying to be over smart and trying to reach the top.

As we all know, in every field, people who reach the top are very, very limited. But there's no harm in aspiring for that or being ambitious towards it. But we should also know the limitations and trying to look at that we should not miss out on the real life and what we are good at.

Some people just pick up the sport just because it's all so hunky dory, at the top, but they don't know the rigorous practices which get into it and the discipline and there are so many things which are important for you to reach there, apart from just being interested, passionate. Every child who comes and says that, the parent says that very ambitious, very passionate and all these things. But do they sustain that? Can they go through the rigours? Will they have that patience and that's what I feel that if you have all that and if you have the God-given talent.

I think you're in the right space. Otherwise you'll have to look where, like I always believe God gives us all of us something. So it's how quickly you identify and move towards that.

Karthik Jeshwanth (Guest): For you to develop any skill or master any skill. If there is no, the destination is not fun added too, I don't think you'll reach the top. When the fun part is not there, it all becomes work and it leads to pressure and under pressure I think decision making is hampered and that is where if you see the real champions who have made it really big have  always enjoyed from the day they started till the day they quit.

Even when I remember the great Sachin Tendulkar when he was asked what is it that you're going to miss after when he played the last test match, there was no reason for him to play because he had achieved everything. But if I remember correctly, he said, it is the sound of the ball hitting the bat. I'm going to miss this. So that is the intrinsic motivation which the person had. Now that is what I feel that it's missing in the present generations.

Karthik Jeshwanth (Guest): When I quit the game I always believed that sport is a part of life. It is not life. So when sport is a part of life, life is a larger picture. You play 20, 25% of your sport, and then there is a big life ahead of you. If the sport has not contributed to your life, then it has got no meaning. Sport has to make friends, sport has to burn the bridges.

Sport has to break down the walls, connect people, but if you see now, the World Cup happening with India, Pakistan playing, not playing. There's so much of animosity. If this is going to be the case now, is it worth playing this sport apart from the fitness reasons which I told you.

The sport should be a factor to get people closer. One team loses, one team wins, the other team throws chairs at each other. There's burning in the stadium. There are fights amongst the fans. These are all not good things, so sports should teach that first.

Then, of course, because money, the commercial pay aspect has become so important in sport, in every sport, whether it is EPL, IPL or World Cups. Any this one, that is taking the front stage, which is not a good thing because this can lead to a big danger which could be irreparable.

Karthik Jeshwanth (Guest): Having the parental backing is always a very good thing for a sports person. I know some of us are blessed with that. Some of us may not be, whether you have the blessings which has an advantage. If you don't have, it's okay because after all, sport is played in the centre and you are all alone. The sports person is all alone. Whether it is your coaches or your parents or your well wishers, they don't come to the centre with the bat or ball with you.

It is all about being alone and taking the fight alone when that is the case when there is more pressure at home that is the parents  who are aspiring their children? Every parent, we got to get that right, that every parent aspires their children to be their best and achieve and be successful.

But in that process there are a lot of parents who put indirect pressure without knowing, without knowing that this is pressurising the child or the athlete because handling pressure is one of the most important things to excel in sport. Some parents think that just being there, I'll do this, I'll do that, I'll do everything for you and taking the sport home, taking the sport to the dining table, it is becoming sport all over the house, which only can add to pressure when the sports person comes to the sports arena on the next day, which is not a good thing.

Sports should be a part of your life, part of your education, especially at that age when that developmental stage, it should be a part of education and sports should go hand in hand. It is not just sport alone. My advice to parents would be to give them all the encouragement support, but don't expect that just because your son plays a sport, he or she should excel in that. You handhold them and see where they go and be a part of them. Don't try to put, don't try to pressurise them in the meaning of trying to help them. You may mean to help them, but actually indirectly putting a lot of pressure on them.

Karthik Jeshwanth (Guest): As a parent, you are trying to tell your child to look for shortcuts and that is no way you're going to reach the top. When you are sticking to one academy, one particular coach, and as per research, especially in cricket, a person from the grassroot  till he reaches to the top that is the Indian team, he or she is exposed to a minimum of 13 coaches, a minimum of 13 coaches, age group coaches. Then the state team coaches, the academy coaches, the childhood coach.

All these, they go through this stage. If it is transitional and it's on the way to progress it is fine. But what is happening currently with these young kids is they see which selector is close to the association, which coach is close to the selector, which club is aligned with the current powers in the association.

You're not teaching your child sport. You're teaching your child politics. You'll be better off putting your son in politics or your daughter in politics rather than sport. Sport is all about you. That is the sports person who has to ecel despite all adversities. So you got to teach him that. Instead what is happening with the current players and the parents is they see that this group is no more in power. The selectors are all belonging to another group. They all move to another academy. It is like teaching your son to rather work hard and go through the exams versus paying a bribe to somebody getting that certificate.

I just barged into a group of 20, 25 young kids, about 18 to 19, 20. I just asked them, what about your school and college? They said with pride, they say that no school, college, sir, only exam, you know, they're feeling so happy that they're beating the system. Imagine if a country like ours, India, has got all degree certificates without knowing what is education without going to school and college, where is our country going? And indirectly, is sport helping or harming our society is what is my worry and people, the mentors who mentor them, telling that it's okay, we will take care of your exams.

You go and spend your time. Yes on the cricket field, yes, it is important to spend time, but when if you're good at it, if you're making a career out of the sport, just because everybody wants to spend time, doesn't make him or her good or excel in that sport. If you are good, you can get better. If you're better, you can be the best. But to become good joining an academy or a club, I don't think it's possible. That is where is a mistake, which the parents have and the children are making and also the coaches are making.

Karthik Jeshwanth (Guest): Cricket is a mental and a physical sport. It's not just a physical sport. You need both of it. When you start young, there is obviously an advantage, you are getting more time. But in cricket, what happens is when you're starting young, you are not developed psychologically i.e.,  mentally or physically.

.Let's say to hit the ball hard. When all the coaches say that your head should be on top of the ball, obviously, when a young child, a 7-year-old, 8-year-old comes and tries to hit the ball, he or she will not be in a position to generate enough power on the ball.

The head will drop and they try to hit that, and that becomes a habit, and they start developing hitting the ball only on the offside where because with the bowler speed, the ball goes a little quicker, then they become one sided.

To rectify that the advantage by starting early, which the player gained for the next coach to work on is the onside game takes many more years which the parents are not understanding. They think that their child starts the game very early. It may hold good in a really physically demanding sport like football or badminton.

But what I don't know about cricket, whether that's a good thing, because I'm sure even in those sports, especially the racket sports, people may be developing bad habits, which the coaches might want to spend time on rectifying. This is the disadvantage of starting early and when they start early, they're fixated with having the end goal in mind, the end goal should be at the end. It should not be at the first. Every day you go to a practice field to improve yourself, to beat yourself, to beat your best. That is why you should be going to the sports field or the sports arena.

Instead, you know, I'm going to achieve this. I'm going to achieve this. You're unnecessarily pressurising yourself and you're losing that fun part of acquiring a skill. To acquire a skill, you need to have that enjoyment behind the effort. If you're only thinking of the destination, I doubt you'll succeed.

If you take the case of Suryavamshi, who's hardly 14, 15 years, I don't think you had any kind of destination that, or he wouldn't even have dreamt that it's at this stage he'll reach that height. What does that say? He just enjoyed hitting the ball. That is how it is. Whether it was a Tendulkar or whether it was a Dravid or anybody, they just enjoyed. I heard Dravid saying that he never started to play for the country or anything.

All this came step by step, into the under 14, into the school team, into the club team, into the state teams. Then slowly they started realising that yes, we belong here.  I think you got to give that kind of time rather than chasing the end goal at the start itself.

Karthik Jeshwanth (Guest): I'll use this to answer in a different, in two parts. One is, I've coached or mentored many players who are very humble and they're holding their place in the society up even after the sport in itself.

Not only Robin, there are many other cricketers, but so being humble, or being in the Sixth Cricket Academy where which is my job, which I come in here every day, I have access to conversations with the great Rahul Dravid very frequently. If it is humility, if it is being humble, I think he should write a book on how to be humble, so such a lovely man who's achieved everything.

He achieved everything in the sport which he aspired for and still, he's such a down to earth person and I think he is a book in itself, for any sportsman to look at rather than just trying to be brash and thinking that as if you conquer the entire world.

Every sportsman should know that it is a sport in which I'm good. I was good because there was a God-given ability anonymously given by the God and be humble rather than you achieved something. You are not a boss.

You are not someone who has taken away the tears of people's eye by inventing some painkillers or aspirin or those kind of things. We are good at sport. That's it. We are entertainers, so let us limit ourselves to that and be humble for what God has given.

Karthik Jeshwanth (Guest): Especially with all young aspirants who come into the academy to take up the sport. Education should be at a higher level than the sports in sport in itself. A  little later, a little later, that is a long way later. Like when you finished your first PUC, second PUC, i.e.,  is 10th, 11th, 12th standard and then we're going into a degree. If there are signals that okay, you are made for a cricket career or a sport career, that is when you cut down on education and spend all your time in sport.

The mistake which people are doing now is the cutting down that time at the school level and trying to reach chase something which they're not good at. That's why I see, I keep telling that, apart from the attitude of the sports person, the hardworking abilities, the discipline and character, apart from this, if the God-given ability, that is a talent which we speak, if it is not there, and the first part which I told, if you have it, you're not going to make it or if you have enormous God-given ability, like you know, we have many examples, which I wouldn't like to mention the names, but if you don't have the attitude, if you don't have the character, if you don't have the discipline, you are going to again, not make it big.

It has to be a combination of both. When it's a combination of both, it becomes the first priority of the parent is to identify whether my child has it in that particular field, maybe cricket, badminton, tennis, or maybe in academics, in whatever. Identify that and then pursue with all your attitude, with your discipline, with character.

Then there is a chance that you'll be around the top. But if you are not there, then the God-given ability is not there and cricket is such a sport that it's very easy for you to identify that whether I belong here or not. There is scorebook.  In the scorebook, it'll be clearly visible for the parent to understand that yes, my son or daughter belongs here to the sport.

Unfortunately, what is happening, people are especially some of these coaches who are not able to handle for different reasons. They coach and these parents get stuck with the wrong kind of coaches, especially at the developmental stage. It's very important for a parent to look at an academy where two, three things like whether the child is safe is he or she in safe hands?
Do the coaches know a bit of knowledge about developing a child, not just develop cricket. These are things which whether my son or daughter has been taught the values which are important for human growth and development. If all these things are there, you are at the right academy versus an academy which just says that will make your son a Tendulkar, will make your son Anil Kumble  or a Dravid that doesn't hold good. This is where our parents are falling for. That is my concern.

Karthik Jeshwanth (Guest): Sport activity is a fun activity, you got to see that enjoyment is not out of the window. That is one, second thing in the name of sport just by people tell you that spend more time, you'll achieve more. No, it's false, just two to three hours of sport that could be before you go to school or after you come back from school, that two, three hours is more than enough, rather than spending the entire day hitting balls, you need to hit balls when you are recognised that you are a state player, when the other teams want you.

There'll be a lot of demand for a particular player. Come and play for my club. Come and join my school. Come and join my college. That  is when you know that you are there somewhere, probably at that time you need to spend more time instead of spending all the time now and compromising on education and then end of the day you don't have a valid degree. You don't, you are not welcomed in foreign universities or the IITs, IIMs in India and then the rest of the life should not be a struggle. That is my worry for this young group of sports people and the parents aspiring parents who want to see their children succeed. I wish them good luck for both the parents and the children who are aspiring to play the sport but don't take your eyes off education.

There will come a time where you yourself will know that you need more time to spend on the sports field. That is the time to back off or take your foot off the pedal on education. Otherwise, education is the priority, and with that two to three hours of sport is more than enough.

Karthik Jeshwanth (Guest): Thank you and wishing you all the best, all the parents and the sports people and the coaches who are listening to it. Good luck to you.