Phillip Hughes: You united us in life and after

By Santosh KumarNovember 30, 2014

25 is no age to talk about what if? What if is what it remains! At 3 days shy of his 26th birthday, Phillip Hughes is a legend in the game - as a cricketer; as a person.

Phillip Hughes united us all in life and in death. There is not one person connected with cricket who has not been touched with the unfortunate circumstance in which lifes cruelty descended upon the gentleman game of cricket.

In the train back home in Sydney on the afternoon of 27th of November 2014, I was reading the news on my iPhone - the customary thing I always do. There was that news - news of Phillip Hughes, the cricketer being no more. He was not my family; not remotely connected in any way. But who says, cricket is not family? I was sitting there and felt an automatic flow of emotion come through my eyes - which the lady next to me felt as well. Such was the impact of you, the champion - Phillip Hughes.

I wondered what made this so special and so different ! Why did it touch us all - all and sundry - his family, team mates, Clarke, Sachin - just about the entire cricketing world.

I am an Indian at heart and soul who lives in Sydney. We love and despise Aussies. Love them - for the spirit and fight that they epitomise; despise cos we want to compete, win and inwardly want to mimic their spirit and fight on the sporting field.

A precocious talent: Phillip Hughes epitomised all that all more. At 19 years, making a debut for Australia he was a Tendulkar for the cricketing fraternity. A young kid on the block who could take the world by storm and have bowlers at his mercy. A twin ton in his first series against South Africa showed what was to come. Phillip was the youngest cricketer to score a hundred in Sheffield Shield and the youngest to score a ton in both innings of a test match.

The underdog: The precocious talent quickly turned to an underdog - a talent on the verge of the next big breakup. Phillip - somehow - inexplicably lost his place 5 times in 26 test matches and was always on the verge of the next big breakup. We love underdogs, the fighter - the cricketer who is in the cusp for potential greatness.

Fighter: Hughes quickly turned from a talent to an underdog to a fighter. A fighter not just professionally but also personally. A fighter who showed grit, ambition and grind. A person who came back 5 times, failed and yet was the first Aussie to hit a century on debut in one-day internationals

Unfulfilled ambition: An ambition was cut short; cut short cruelly - on the very place where the talent thrived, the fighter was born, the underdog was rooted for - the 22 yard cricket pitch against a short ball which has lived in this gentlemans game since 1877. At 3 hundreds in 26 test matches there was more to come. At 63 not out when it all ended; there was more to come - no more.

Unity in life & beyond: Phillip Champion Hughes - you united us for your talent that we all yearn, the success we desire, the fight that life embodies, the ambition that cricket thrives on - you unite us in life and in death: RIP Phillip Champion Hughes.