Indian cricket is facing another big scandal. The match fixing scandal turned away a lot of fans and the recent revelations about infighting and factions within the team are sure to turn away another generation.

I have been reading quite a lot (blogs, newspapers, etc.) and reading the comments sections on the electronic media brings up a couple of interesting points:

1. The general person/fan has chosen sides.

People have their favorite player(s). If their favorite player is criticized or accused, be prepared for a vehement rebuttal and a request for fairer and more balanced treatment of their favored star.

2. The same set of folks are more than willing to sling mud on the supposed "other side".

What this means is that there are very few who are willing to be critical of their own heroes and be balanced about players/coaches they don't agree with.

It seems like a clear case of misplaced loyalty. Indian cricket fans should have their loyalty to the Indian cricket team first and the individual players second. Seems obvious but somehow most folks seemed to have just missed this.

For a long time success of the big 3 (Tendulkar, Ganguly, Dravid) & perhaps Laxman (in test matches) was directly related to the success/failure of the team. Somewhere along the road fans started supporting the players instead of the team and the whole controversy around dropping Ganguly and Chappell's antics just polarized the fan base.

Today, most fans have tunnel vision in which their personal hero is faultless while the other players/coach are to blame.

I think its time for the fans to take a step back and look at the team and decide what is in the team's best interests. Then decide whether the players (big, small, or upcoming) fit into the team goals.

Once you approach the problem from the team perspective and personal loyalties to a player become secondary, we should see a more balanced and logical discussion on how and where we want the Indian team to go.