The world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page.

One of the most interesting features of international cricket is the tour system. I don't see tours playing such an important role in other sports, atleast not of such gigantic propotions as in cricket. Often the strength of a team is determined on the basis of its performance on an away tour. I bet more points will be associated with an away tour win in Australia for the Indian team than it being crowned as the world cup winners. An away series is the ultimate test that can be thrown up to any team.

Its both a test of mind and matter. Well sports is always a test of mind. But I assume that this test is being done at a more abstract level, at a hidden level if I may say so. But on an away tour a test of mind, the character, the softer aspects is a well outlined subject in the datesheet of exams delivered to the players. The players have to often slug it out in an inhospitable terrain for sometimes as much as three months on a stretch. For three months. All this time you are away from the family, play in conditions you are not fimiliar with, eat food you haven't developed taste for, adjust to an altogether different climate, plus play at stretch on venues where your supporters are outnumbered one to a zillion. I find it uncomfortable putting up for a day at an unfimiliar place and cricketers do it for sometimes as much as 100 days. At these tours often players have to look at each other for support. And ironically these are the times when the small cuts grow to big wounds and often leave an everlasting scar. God forbids if a situation like a Sidhu-Azharuddin emerges, like it did on the '96 Indian cricket team's tour of England. Or more recently the Ganguly-Chappel fiasco no matter it popped up on a relatively easy tour. Tours as much as they test the skill are also a test of character. No wonder they call cricket the gentleman's game. I associate character with a gentleman.

It becomes especially difficult if you are on a loosing spree. Nerves of stainless steel often get stained, ask Steve Waugh about that ill fated tour of Pakistan in 1990-91. And the milder ones often dont recover. Ask the English team collectively, who took a generation to reclaim the Ashes. But Shakespeare said: 'There is a tide in the affairs of men,which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;Omitted, all the voyage of their life is bound in shallows and in miseries'. Promising teams often blossom into great ones when the flood gates to supremecy are opened in tours. An important tour is coming up early next year, just a few days from now. For all the talk of the 2007 world cup, it may well determine the course of international cricket.