India has won over a 'depleted' Australia in a cricket match at Delhi. Eulogies on Dhoni, that had started from previous match, will continue. He might be a great 'captain' but I still havent got the feeling that he is a good wicket-keeper, in the first place. Kumar Sangakkara did talk about 'dilution' or lowering of standards in wicket-keeping. In India, I think we have not seen a good wicket-keeper since Kiran More and maybe as the Cricinfo talk suggested, role of wicket-keepers has reduced or changed. The critical point is that people or cricket boards had started feeling that it is not good enough to be a wicket keeper alone, probably because of Gilchrist's success. Then it later changed to 'good enough' wicket keeper and more importantly, 'all-in-all' wicket keeper (batsman who can keep wickets). I am not sure about other teams, but India started this '$crewed up' theory first of 'good enough' wicket-keeper. Sanjay Manjrekar doubled up as a wicket-keeper for some matches. Rahul Dravid could have his place in the team only if he could keep wickets. I dont think Dravid did a 'sacrifice' by keeping wickets. If he didnt agree, he would probably have to sit out. 'Wicket-keeper' changed to 'wicket-keeper batsman' and now to 'batsman wicket-keeper'.
On the other extreme, we have companies or people who want to be 'all-in-all', not thinking if they are competent enough. Music directors started singing long back, actors started producing long back, actors started directing long back. I remember Kamalhassan repeated the quote, maybe a decade back, in an interview published in Hindu, 'Specialization is for insects'. Even in Cricinfo round table discussion, it was agreed that Sobers was the best. The problem is that only few or handful of people are good enough to be 'all-in-all'. Sobers could get into a team by virtue of his batting ALONE or by his virtue of bowling ALONE. As Michael Holding said, there is no point in fiddling around with people who could do a little bit or this and little bit of that. Ian Chappell slammed the theory of someone who could get 20 runs, bowl 7 overs and save 5 runs on field :))
This is not a scenario in cricket alone. There is a slow change in mindset of people (rather 'market') that 'high quality' will be costly and therefore 'good enough' is good enough. I remember reading in HBR some years back about US companies vying for China's good-enough market. My brother-in-law who was working in Cummins, also agreed with this article because he thought Cummins was doing exactly this to get into markets like Africa or Asia. 'High quality' products cost a lot, but if sales volume is high with 'good enough' (ie cheaper) products although with lower margins, it can more than compensate. We dont have to even go abroad for such examples, when we have ample things closer home. I think Tamil Nadu was always leading in such ideas or philosophy and no better example than Saravana Stores. Some, especially the rich or wanna-be rich, would not associate Saravana Stores with 'high quality', but there is no doubt that their turnover will be the highest in Tamil Nadu. It is good-enough if we are good-enough ;)
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