When Pujara batted with his father on surgeon's table, when Sampras won Australian Open for cancer-ridden coach, a case for cricket's silent battles…

Indian Express

26-07-2025

One of the most arresting images of this Test series would be Rishabh Pant walking in to bat despite his fractured foot and Old Trafford giving him a standing ovation. This act of courage to battle on one foot would have inducted him in the yet to be built cricket's Hall of Fame of the Walking Wounded. Other pictures expected to be placed on the proposed Wall will be those of Anil Kumble bowling with a strapped jaw and Malcolm Marshall batting with a plastered hand.
These are wounds the world can see and can also connect to. Who hasn't experienced a scratch or bruise and not known physical pain? But this isn't the only suffering known to man or endured by the sportspersons.
Like Pant, Kumble and Marshall, there have been equally courageous cricketers, if not more, who have dealt with much deeper wounds that even painkillers can't extenuate. Not everyone knows, or understands, the weight of carrying a deep worry or some pain deep inside when walking on the field. Those who battle the pain inside aren't eulogised enough.
During the next Test at The Oval, there would be acknowledgement of internal conflicts, angst, guilt and mental trauma that players endure on cricket's unbearably long tours. The long and storied cricketing tale of England and Surrey player Graham Thorpe will be remembered and celebrated during the final Test of the Anderson-Tendulkar series.
He was a family man and the immensely likeable Thorpey for his team mates. The middle-order batsman once scored a gritty 118 runs off 301 balls at Lahore to give England a rare win in Pakistan. It was hailed as a tenacious knock of a mentally-strong batsman, little did the world know that the batsman was dealing with anxiety and depression for several years.
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Even after his playing days, he remained on the circuit, Thorpe was England's batting coach but was sacked after the 2022 Ashes tour where a video of him, in company of cops, at a drinking session emerged. This incident, and the sacking, would spiral him into depression. Now it has emerged that during this period, Thorpe had asked his wife Amanda to 'to help him end his life'.
A few weeks later, Thorpe, 55, took his life, hit by a running train. His one-time teammate Michael Atherton, in a touching piece in the Times on his late friend he grew up with, would recall the mental breakdown Thorpe suffered during the Lord's Test of 2002. About that period Thorpe had later written: 'There came a time when I would have given back all my Test runs and Test caps to be happy again'.
Former England opener Marcus Trescothick too dealt with the demons in his mind during a glittering career of 76 Tests and an average of 43. Missing home and being absent when the family needed him were the reasons for his trauma. But like Thorpe, on the field, he was the trusted solid opener. A tough wicket for the opposition and a reassuring presence for his team. Incessant touring saw him torn between his professional commitments and family responsibilities. He once had to rush home as his wife was dealing with postpartum depression and a seriously ill close relative. When Trescothick rushed home only to be received by his baby who failed to recognise him, he couldn't take it anymore. He quit international cricket and played for his county so that he can be back home to catch 'Peppa Pig' or 'Dora the Explorer' with his kids.
Players over the years have walked to the turf distracted by worrying news from home – an ailing child or hospitalised relative. They didn't wear bandages, they didn't hobble to the ground, their scans didn't make it to the headlines and they didn't get a standing ovation. Many times the world didn't even know about it.
Babar Azam's mother was on a ventilator when he was opening the innings, stitching the unbeaten partnership with Mohammed Rizwan, in the 2021 T20 World Cup game against England. His father, in an Insta post, revealed that 'on the day the match was against India, Babar's mother was on a ventilator. He played all three matches in severe distress.'
For Indian batsman Cheteshwar Pujara during the 2018-19 historic series of Australia, where India won the series, he too had got disturbing news. For a while his wife hid the doctor's advice after his father's heart condition. But on the day of the surgery, she did inform her husband. It was a surreal experience for the Pujara family. When his wife and father were in the hospital lobby, watching on the television, he was on the way to the most difficult hundred of his career.
On Pakistan's 2019 tour of England, Pakistan batsman Asif Ali was going through hell. He was making arrangements for his daughter's treatment on the phone, arranging for her travel to the US. It was on this tour, he hit a career-best score. Tragedy struck Asif towards the end of the tour when he was told that his daughter had moved to the other world.
On rare occasions, the world gets to see a player dealing with mental trauma. During the 1995 Australian Open, Pete Sampras was on court playing his arch rival Jim Courier. This was just a day after his long-time coach Tim Gullikson had to go home after scans had shown he had brain cancer. He seemed to be gulping down the lump in his throat and the pain inside with water. That's when someone from the crowd shouted: 'Do it for your coach, Pete'. Sampras broke down, he was wiping his tears between rallies. Courier would offer help from the other side of the court – 'We can do this (the match) some other time.' Sampras acknowledged his rival's sympathy but continued playing to win the thrilling five-setter.
This was triumph much bigger than any of his Slams. This was an athlete achieving a far tougher test than winning the battle on one foot.