Great Sportsperson is all about Courage and Courage is Not a Perfume!

Two chess champions were in the news last week.

Viswanathan Anand became world chess champion on September 29, 2007 and former world chess champion Garry Kasparov-only human never conquered by Anand- decided to run for Russian president on October 1, 2007.

Kasparov’s book “HOW LIFE IMITATES CHESS” was published this year.

The Times Literary Supplement wrote: “…Kasparov is not only the greatest chess player the world has ever seen, he is also the leader of the opposition and the last hope of democracy in Russia. He has been brave enough to defy the man he refers to contemptuously as “a mere lieutenant-colonel in the KGB” with nothing more than his wits to live by. So the game Kasparov is now playing with President Putin is for his life…

He explains that his decision to retire from professional chess in 2005 – still the highest-rated player after two decades – was “largely based on what I saw as the need to join the resistance to the catastrophic expansion of authoritarian state power in my home country”…

Yet this coded manifesto of a book is only the latest sign that his courage at the chessboard has not deserted him in the political arena.”

I gave up playing cricket very early in life because I kept taking my eyes off fast, moving, red, hardball. Therefore, I admire those cricketers most who show fearless attitude on and some times off the sporting arena.

Few Indian names from the hall of courage:

Mohinder Jimmy Amarnath (easily most courageous of them all), Sunil Gavaskar, Anshuman Gaikwad, and Rahul Dravid. They wouldn’t flinch from playing a fastball with their body if they thought otherwise they would nick it with their bat.

Vivian Richards on courage:
“'My first captain (Brian Close) was an inspiration to me. I knew all about him from the 1963 series. How he kept walking down the pitch to Wes Hall and Charlie Griffith in the Lord's Test. Several times Wes had to stop in his run-up to check out what was happening.

'I think I was pretty tough as a youngster. But Closey was tougher still. He reinforced the message that you yield to no one. …..I learnt so much from him - not necessarily about technique but about attitude.

'Man, he was brave. I remember playing against Gloucestershire and Closey was fielding at silly point. Mike Procter leant back and cracked a square cut. The ball hit Closey on the head and ballooned towards Dennis Breakwell. But Dennis watched the man rather than the ball and joined the rush to see if the captain was OK. When he came to Close's first words were "Did we get him?" He was none too pleased to hear that Dennis had failed to complete the catch.

'I was fielding at short leg when Close was playing for England in 1976 at the age of 46…..'Anyway, at Old Trafford, Close got hit in the chest by Wayne Daniel and sank to the floor. OK, I was playing for my country, but this was my skipper on the ground and in pain. So I went up to him. "Are you OK, skipper?" Closey eventually gathered himself together and bellowed "Fuck off." What a man.”



Artist: Helen E. Hokinson The New Yorker May 30, 1942