Today’s sports world – only an entertainment or more than it?

Okay, so I’m not a sportsperson, nor a sports fan. However, being in India, being on social network, it is obvious that I can not escape from the influence of cricket. Every day of semi finals or finals of a small (IPL) or a big (international) tournament, most of the men (and some women) in my friend list pour in a ton of posts about how strong Team India is, how good MS Dhoni is as a captain and how much of a loser the opposition team is, especially if it is Pakistan. This increases exponentially when the match is a win, again, especially if it is Pakistan. If it is a lose, posts of the sort “It doesn’t matter if it is a win or a lose; We love you Indian cricket team” follow.

Though I’m tired of all these posts, I know I have no rights to blame these people for sharing these sorts of posts because, oh.. come on! it is social media.. and everyone has rights to post what they want. But why am I tired of all these posts? Well, imagine yourself opening your account one day to find that it is flooded with posts related to Nuclear Science, and you have to swim through (swipe down if you’re using a phone or scroll down in case of a computer) the downpour to find photos or check-ins of your friends or information shared by some of the groups you are interested in, and you keep finding repetitive posts of how neutrons bombard with atoms to create nuclear fusion and how beautiful is the process. Additionally, imagine that this repetition continues every weekend. Now, I guess you understand my frustration. However, I don’t expect any reduction in the number of posts on cricket because I know it is not possible to change the majority of cricket lovers for the sake of the minority of cricket non-lovers.

Let me get into the topic now. It is true that I’m annoyed of the above mentioned posts, but there is one sort of post that humiliates me as a woman. And I’m sure you would have guessed that it is about Anushka Sharma and Virat Kohli. I do not know anything of their relationship, I have not followed any news of them and I’m not interested as well. Keeping aside the discussion of the truthfulness of the rumour about their relationship or their breakup or their getting back together, or the debate of whether it is okay to discuss the personal life of the stars, there is one irresistible question in my mind. “What does Anushka have to do with Kohli’s performance?”

Why was Anushka blamed for Kohli’s unexpected awful performance last year? Why is she thanked for breaking up with him after he scored consistently and exceptionally this year? Is Kohli not responsible for his performance? Is he not to be blamed for not keeping himself in good form? Would anyone blame Kohli if Anushka didn’t act well in a movie? Why do men blame women for all the bad things and take credit to themselves when things turn out well?

The agonizing part of this is that there are also some women who share this kind of posts in social media, not recognizing that it is disgrace to the entire female population on earth and not only to Anushka. The ridiculous part is that the men who share posts accusing Anushka are the same men who share Kohli’s statement in defense of her. But you know what? It is not actually ridiculous. The former part denunciates her, while the latter part admires him. It is an indirect way of men telling women about how a woman is evil enough to threaten a man’s career and how the man is sympathetic enough to talk in defense of her.

About Kohli, I’m not entirely appreciative of his talk in her defense. His statement has given him an ‘open-mindedness‘ tag when he is already appreciated for his phenomenal accomplishments this year. My question to him is why he hasn’t defended her last year when people blamed her for his rough performance.