Vaibhav Sooryavanshi Fever Grips London Even Before His India Debut
Boria Majumdar
Vaibhav Sooryavanshi hasn’t yet made his presence felt in international cricket. And yet, he was the only talking point at Lord’s a couple of days ago. Walk into the press box, and you hear journalists talking about him and him alone.
“A lot of people are selling off their Pavilion tickets to go and watch the 10 July game because they think Vaibhav will be playing,” said one. “The women’s Test at Lord’s starts on 10 July.”
Another senior reporter who had been asked to track him put things into perspective. “It is almost impossible to get print space when the FIFA World Cup is on. And yet we have been specifically told to cover Vaibhav in detail. He is almost like a football star at the moment.”
Yet one more, equally excited, added: “We generally don’t do podcasts on T20 matches. Our focus has always been Test cricket. But we are making an exception for Vaibhav and will be doing podcasts for this [T20I] series. He is the draw.”
The hype surrounding Sooryavanshi is fascinating. He is the new star on the block and is clearly the absent presence in every cricket conversation. While, on the one hand, we want to move away from star culture and the focus on individuals, on the other, Vaibhav is being hyped by everyone because that is what sells. Sport needs its stars to build narratives, and that is why it will always be impossible to move beyond star culture in cricket.
The Indian team has, so far, dealt with the hype well. They have successfully managed to shut out the outside noise and have cocooned Vaibhav from public scrutiny. Opinion is clearly divided on whether India should hand Vaibhav his debut, but the team management seems to know exactly what it is doing. As I have said before, I agree with the management on this one. There is no reason to look beyond Abhishek Sharma and Sanju Samson just yet, and Vaibhav needs to wait for his turn. It is both a fair and logical call.
That, however, won’t deter people in the UK from hyping him up. The T20 series, otherwise a routine affair, has suddenly become a showpiece simply because Vaibhav is part of the squad. Some, like Michael Vaughan, have already labelled him the best T20 player in the world at the moment and have criticised the Indian management for not playing him.
The build-up around the 15-year-old is a sociological study in itself. It shows how sport thrives on narratives and stars; how certain individuals have the ability to draw fans to stadiums and influence ticket sales; and how broadcasters need compelling characters to sell a story. While Vaibhav may be unaware of much of it, he will be appropriated and consumed in multiple ways over the next few weeks before the focus inevitably shifts to Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma ahead of the ODI series.
In fact, it could be argued that, purely in terms of stardom, the baton is ready to pass from Virat to Vaibhav. The UK is a compelling case study.
Follow Revsportz for latest sports news
The post Vaibhav Sooryavanshi Fever Grips London Even Before His India Debut appeared first on Sports News Portal | Revsportz.
Comments
Post a Comment