Leadership is practiced not so much in words as in attitude and in actions, said, Harold Geenen. And Sourav Ganguly did exactly that 14 years ago when he led his team to Australia in the first test at the GABA, Brisbane test. He was targeted by the Australian media for his inability to paly short and bouncing deliveries and told him to be ready for some ‘chin music’. It was a mind game which Australian Media and team had launched against a man who stopped their invincible run when they visited India in 2001-02 and lost the series 2-1 to Ganguly and his team. They wanted revenge of that loss and it was evident that Ganguly would have been their obvious target and they did exactly that.

So what did Sourav Ganguly do? He did exactly what are great leaders are made of. Instead of sending in Sachin after Dravid’s wicket, he walked ahead of him. He knew if he had to get ahead in this mind games he would have to do the talking with his bat. And his bat did the talking, Ganguly scored a controlled, well- paced innings of 144 in the first innings to give India a respectable total. Although the match ended in a draw but it set the tone for the series which was ‘We are here to fight and win’. And they did win the next test at Adelaide. The series ended in a draw and India retained the Gavaskar –Border trophy. For his leadership Ganguly earned massive respect in the cricket community. It was just another show of ‘Dadagiri’ in the country where India had not won a single test match in 22 years.

Footage: cricket.com.au