What Aryaman Birla could learn from Gavaskar: Bat freely, ignore the scoreboard

The useful thing about the past is that it sometimes has solutions for present problems. That is why the cricketer Aryaman Birla, who is suffering from game-related anxiety, should seek a meeting with Sunil Gavaskar. A few days ago, Birla, the Madhya Pradesh opener who was recently let go by Rajasthan Royals, opened up about his condition on social media. “I’ve been coping with severe anxiety related to the sport for a while now,” he wrote. “And so, I’ve decided to take an undefined sabbatical from cricket.”

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A post shared by Aryaman V Birla (@aryamanvb) on Dec 20, 2019 at 5:06am PST

Professional help is Birla’s primary need. And it can safely be assumed he has sought it. He is, after all, the son of Kumar Mangalam and Neerja Birla. Neerja Birla has dealt with depression and now does a lot of work in mental health. Since Aryaman’s anxiety is related to his sport, he should talk to Gavaskar about one particular innings the latter played. It was a knock in which he set his mind free.


India were playing the West Indies, then at the height of their powers and thirsting for revenge after their 1983 World Cup defeat at India’s hands. Gavaskar was on the verge of equalling Don Bradman’s record of 29 Test centuries. It had become a monkey on the back because wherever he went, people reminded him about it.

“When one got close to the 29th century mark,” Gavaskar said in an interview in 2008, “you got off the aircraft and the aircraft maintenance guys, they’d be saying that [talking about the record]. You’d have room service breakfast, the guy who’d deliver it, instead of asking for a complimentary ticket, would say we want your 29th here.

So the pressure used to build up. We didn’t have iPods then so we had to listen to the taalis as well as gaalis.” The quality of opposition made the task harder. West Indies routed India in the first Test in Kanpur. Gavaskar scored zero and seven. Adding insult to injury was an explosive Malcolm Marshall delivery, sending the bat spinning from Gavaskar’s hands. For a batsman of that calibre, this was humiliation.

It was in this background that the second Test started in Delhi. And this is what Gavaskar did: He abandoned his usual cautious approach and batted free. Marshall, who had embarrassed him just days ago, was hooked for boundaries.



There were cuts, pulls, drives and more hooks. Gavaskar sped to his century in a mere 94 balls. Another habit of Gavaskar’s could be useful to Aryaman, or anyone else who frets about their game. He would not look at the scoreboard, and instead focussed on finishing a session at the crease, then another, and so forth. He says that even when he got to his 29th century, he did not immediately realise it. And it was the non-striker, Dilip Vengsarkar, who said to him, “Bloody hell, it’s your 29th!”

Aryaman has a century for Madhya Pradesh against his name. And if he picks up the phone, he could have more.