Social
media, has for a significant while, been an effective tool for sportspersons to
communicate with their fans directly and without any barriers. Gone are the
days when supporters had to be content with a drip feed of interviews over the
length of a player’s career and a tell-all autobiography at the end of it. Now,
all one needs to do is to scroll through the social media handles of Virat
Kohli, Serena Williams, LeBron James et al to know in real-time what his or her
favourite athlete is doing. Sites like The Players’ Tribune, founded in 2014 by
baseball icon Derek Jeter after his retirement from the New York Yankees, works
with athletes to tell their own stories. Athletes’ scepticism and the total
control the star can exercise over the message have combined to mostly render
the athlete-media relationship frayed. For the sporting stars themselves, a
thriving online presence has become essential to complement their on-field /
on-court exploits.
During
the COVID-19 lockdown, when live sport around the world came to a grinding
halt, this slow but discernible change underwent another mutation. Journalists,
who were already edgy about their utility in a world where sportspersons were
directly speaking to their fans, watched with disbelief athletes interview each
other. The press, which often thinks of itself as the gatekeeper, saw its party
being gate-crashed. As if to rub it in, Harsha Bhogle, that charmingly erudite
IIM graduate-turned-sports commentator who thankfully remained a one-off,
called it “a great challenge” for reporters. “Players are doing what journos do
and they have greater access and obvious camaraderie,” he tweeted. “Journos can
either accept this situation, play second fiddle and live off quotes, or raise
their game significantly.” It was unwanted pressure for the pioneers of “he
said, she said” journalism.
***********
In
mid-May Virat Kohli was the guest on Sunil Chhetri’s Instagram live chat
show Eleven on Ten. The camaraderie on display and kind of answers
the two elicited from each other was eye-catching. It was friendly and
gregarious, completely in contrast to the average journalist's interaction with
a star. Kohli narrated an incident from his younger days in Delhi when his
father was asked to do “pay a little extra” (possibly pay a bribe) to confirm
his selection in the team. Kohli senior refused to do so and Kohli junior
didn’t get selected. “I cried a lot; I was broken,” Kohli said. “But that
incident taught me a lot. I realised that I had to be extraordinary to become
successful, and that I had to achieve this purely through my own effort and
hard work. My father showed me the right way, through action and not merely
words.” It was a story that had never come out previously, at least to our
knowledge. It then became the sledgehammer that fans used to beat the already
maligned cricket governing bodies in Delhi. How we journalists wished one of us
had broken that story. That credit went to Chhetri, India’s best footballer,
who was in no need of a second career option. COVID-19 had turned us into mere
spectators and it was a glimpse of how sports journalism will look if athletes
decide that reporters are dispensable.
***********
April
and May are generally months during which Rafael Nadal is seen sinking his
teeth into the European clay season. It would invariably culminate with the
title at the French Open. This year, the Spaniard was instead making his debut
in an Instagram Live show with Roger Federer and Andy Murray. So
technologically challenged he was that he struggled to even get Federer and
Murray into the chat room. Murray even took a playful dig by saying: “This is
brilliant… He can win 52 French Opens, but not work Instagram!” Then started
the banter, about Nadal playing as a lefty when he was naturally right-handed,
his and Federer’s struggles while juggling school and tennis when they were
young and Murray mischievously nudging Nadal to become a father soon. Then came
the journalism. Federer provided an update about his repaired knee and the
progress he had made, something reporters were dying to know but had no way of
ascertaining. Nadal then revealed that he hadn’t hit a tennis ball for nearly
six weeks, forcing Federer to joke that the Spaniard would have forgotten how
to play tennis. We all know what happened at the French Open. Then Murray
excitedly shared information about his recovery from his right hip injury.
Reporters were quick to turn the whole thing into a news feature. But at the
end of it all they can be forgiven if they were left wondering who was in
control. Do athletes need the media or does the media need the athlete?
***********
YouTube
is a different beast. If Instagram is T20, YouTube is Test cricket. You can
wait patiently for characters to feel at ease and the plot to thicken without
any distractions. Here, R. Ashwin’s eclectically titled shows were a big draw.
From Sunil Gavaskar to Anil Kumble to Sanju Samson, there were guests from
every generation. Even Radio Jockeys and yesteryear actors were featured. A
thinking cricketer himself, Ashwin slipped into the role of an interviewer
effortlessly, leaving journalists to feed off quotes – remember Bhogle – yet
again. A lot of the questioning was serious too. The press, which often to its
own detriment exhibits an exaggerated sense of self-importance, and
nonchalantly dismissed earlier efforts on Instagram as entertainment dressed up
as journalism, was forced to sit up and take notice. So it didn’t come as a
surprise that it was during one of those chats with his Delhi Capitals coach
Ricky Ponting that the first signs of thaw between Ashwin and the former Aussie
captain over ‘Mankading’ emerged. In an ideal world, the back and forth between
two sportspersons with opposing views would have played out with reporters
acting as carriers. But not anymore. Governments of the day may talk about
eliminating middlemen but sportspersons have long shown how it is done, and
with clinical precision.
***********
Baseline
Ventures, a sports marketing and entertainment company, joined the dots much
before anybody did and developed a business opportunity. It represents India
cricketers Jemimah Rodrigues and Smriti Mandhana and Olympic silver medallist
PV Sindhu. The trio combined for the first episode of Double Trouble, where the
social media-savvy Jemimah, and Smriti, interviewed Sindhu. It was natural and
casual and made the line between the interviewer and interviewee disappear. If
journalists and their subjects treated each other like drinking buddies it
would have called into question their ethics. Here there was no such
inhibition, with the people involved behaving like friends and not
acquaintances. Sindhu, otherwise guarded in front of the press, surprised
everyone with her candour and relaxed demeanour. It was a breath of fresh
air….for the public, not us. Rohit Sharma and Sania Mirza featured too. We
learnt how Rohit practised hitting wide yorkers from Lasith Malinga over the
point fielder for sixers and how Sania dealt with the different yardsticks the
world applied to men and women. The media watched, transcribed and wrote, just
like facts that are regurgitated during most examinations.
N. Sudarshan
