A visibly irked Sunil Gavaskar hit out at Nasser Hussain during a pre-match show ahead of the England-India Headingley Test, questioning Hussain’s newspaper column where he said that Virat Kohli’s Test team isn’t bullied ‘like the previous generations’ of Indian cricket.
Speaking ahead of the toss at Headingley, Sony Sports presenter Harsha Bhogle brought up Hussain’s Monday column in the Daily Mail in which the former England skipper wrote that he expected “more iron fists than velvet gloves” from Joe Root. Speaking about the article on the show, Hussain said that “this Indian side won’t take a backward step”, and he expected Joe Root to be getting tough with his players and staff as well.
Referring to an article from two days ago by Hussain for the same publication, a part of which read “This India are not a side who will be bullied, as perhaps previous generations have been”, Gavaskar took on Hussain, asking what he meant exactly by being “bullied”.
Gavaskar said: “Just to take that article a little further, you said that this India is not a side that will be bullied as perhaps the previous generations have been. Belonging to the previous generation, I…could you perhaps enlighten which generations? And what exactly is the meaning of bullied?”
Hussain replied saying that the current team under Kohli doesn’t back away from a fight, and it’s the sort of feistiness he’s seen Kohli carry on from Ganguly’s team. Hussain responded: “Nah, I just think sometimes, this Indian side, under the aggression that they’ve had in the past, would have just said ‘No No No’. But I think Kohli, what he has done, is absolutely go hard, go doubly hard.”
“I saw that in Sourav Ganguly’s side and I think Sourav started it off, and Virat [is continuing]…even when Virat was not there, Ajinkya [Rahane], in Australia, went really went hard at the opposition. I don’t think that’s the way to go – we used to play against certain batsmen like Brian Lara…you just keep quiet when Brian came to the crease. You don’t want to wake him up. I just don’t think you want to wake this Indian side up.”
Gavaskar then went on to list down India’s Test series in England during his playing career, passionately explaining that the side fought hard against the hosts, but never got bullied or took a backward step. He added: “Yeah, but when you say previous generations were bullied. I don’t think so. I’d be very upset if my generation was being talked about as being bullied. Because if you have a look at the record, and we speak only from 1971 [the year Gavaskar debuted]…in 1971 we won, that was my first tour to England. We won that series 1-0.
“1974, we had internal problems so we lost that pretty badly, 3-0. 1979, it was 1-0, we could have been 1-1 if we chased down 438 at The Oval [match was drawn with India on 429 for 8]. [In] 1982, it was again 1-0 in a three-match series we lost. In 1986 we won 2-0, we could have won it 3-0. That is my generation. And I don’t think we were bullied. And not for a moment did we take a backward step either.”
Gavaskar then went on to say that the current Indian team’s definition of aggression isn’t applicable to all teams, and you can show passion “without yelling at every wicket that falls.” He added: “I don’t think aggression means you have got to be in the face of the opposition. You can show passion, you can show that the commitment to your team is total, without looking to be yelling at every wicket that falls.”
Hussain responded by saying: “I, for one, quite like how Kohli leads this side, that’s all I’ll say…cricket is very important to me. I used to lead a side, I used to wear my heart on my sleeve, and I love the way Kohli leads this side…cricket is very important in India, as you know, and I love the way Kohli ensures this team knows it’s important.”
Gavaskar continued to defend the manner in which the sides he was a part of played, He said: “That’s absolutely right… there’s no argument with that. The argument and the question is only about saying that the previous generations were bullied. I don’t think that is right.”
Bhogle tried to diffuse the tension between the two by jumping in and ending a conversation: “We’ll keep chatting, we’ll keep chatting… I think you’re doing the toss so we’ll have to let you go. We’ll have a longer conversation too.”
There were plenty of reactions on Twitter to the exchange.
https://twitter.com/RaunakRK/status/1430458234725224449
Sunil Gavaskar ‘bullies’ @nassercricket a bit on air: reminds him there was a Pre Kohli India generation that played with passion and also knew how to win. Aggression doesn’t always have to be in your face. Don’t forget 1-0 1971, 2-0 in 1986 against much better English sides!👍
— Rajdeep Sardesai (@sardesairajdeep) August 25, 2021
Sunil Gavaskar having a go at Nasser Hussain on the Sony pre-show for the latter's Dailymail column where he writes: "This India are not a side who will be bullied, as perhaps previous generations have been." Feisty start off the field #ENGvIND
— Ayan (@ayan_acharya13) August 25, 2021
