With India all set to take on England in a five-game Test series scheduled to kick off from June 20, through mutual discussions within the BCCI (Board of Control for Cricket in India) and the ECB (England and Wales Cricket Board), the series between the two teams, which was originally called the Pataudi Trophy, is being renamed as the Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy.
Originally named after the late Mansur Ali Khan Pataudi, the decision to rebrand the trophy has not sat well with former India cricketer Sunil Gavaskar. Speaking on the same, Gavaskar opined that the rebranding of the trophy shows a lack of sensitivity towards the late MAK Pataudi and his contributions to Indian cricket.
"The recent news that the ECB is going to retire the Pataudi Trophy, given to the winners of the Test series between England and India in England, is disturbing indeed. This is the first time one has heard of a trophy named after individual players being retired, though the decision is entirely the ECB’s, and the BCCI may well have been informed. It shows a total lack of sensitivity to the contribution made by the Pataudis to cricket in both England and India,” Gavaskar wrote in his column for Sportstar.
Gavaskar hopes for no such instances of trophy rebranding in the future
Furthermore, Gavaskar also wrote about how he hoped that if any future cricketers get the opportunity to get a trophy in their name, they would have the sense to decline to preserve the contributions of the legends to Indian cricket.
"There may well be a new trophy named after more recent players, and here’s hoping that if an Indian player has been approached, he will have the good sense to politely decline — not only out of respect for two former India captains but also to avoid the same fate of having a trophy named after him retired after he is gone,” he wrote.