The Art of Opening the Batting

“I have never been able to play consistently with soft hands.” ~Virender Sehwag

Sehwag is astonishingly ridiculous so here are some instructions –

1. Read the quote

2. Laugh at the absurdity

Facing the first ball of the match is equivalent to raising your hand in a math class to answer a question while a crowd stares and waits for you to make a mistake.

You could wake up feeling on top of the world, only to be dismissed on the first ball of the innings, or feel like a slump to outperform your expectations. The main obstacle to opening the batting is that all the possible eyes are on you with the presence of intimidating energy from the fielders around you. The entire opposition team is waiting for you to make that inch-worthy mistake to pounce on. The hope with which you walk to the crease reveals your attitude towards batting. But on the inside, you are trying to calm the heart rate down to its slowest possible beat because your legs are at their weakest, your gloves have already started to get wet, and your anxiety levels have skyrocketed. The bowler has been waiting for this matchup since the night before. He envisions a possible outswinger that gets nicked to the keeper or a ball that nips back in, to go through the defense of the batter. As a batter, you hope to see the ball go away from the stump to shoulder arms and “live to fight another day”. Of course, if you are an optimist, then you would hope for any ball that drops near your leg to flick it away for possible runs.

You are never settled in until you get that first run. Apart from getting a single on 99, there is nothing more challenging than getting off strike especially when you are out of form. You could drop the ball and look at your partner with desperation, you could slash at a ball but mistime it straight to the fielder, you could middle the ball but have a hovering fielder stop it, or even worse, you could do everything right and then the umpire signals for a dead ball. Your heart sinks by the minute before you take that first run. It is different when you are in form and have experience. You either drive past covers on the first ball to gobble up the boundary or you “take your time” and get your first run whenever necessary.

Walking into bat as an opener has challenges that no other batter will understand. You are either looking at the scoreboard and calculating the required run rate or looking within you, hoping to provide a good start for the team. However, it also has its rewards that no other batter will ever be able to live through. Some might arguably say that the no.3 batter is your third opener. But the feeling of walking in to bat with your partner, staying put the entire innings, and walking back knowing that you did everything expected of you without losing your wicket, is the most conquering feeling in the game of cricket.

What is it like to open the batting?

”At the start of my career, when I used to toss and turn at night, I was fighting that feeling and wanting to go to sleep. Now I know that’s normal, so I’ll just get up and watch TV or something. I know it’s just my subconscious mind getting ready for a game.” Sachin Tendulkar

It is an art form that will live as long as the game.

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